On finishing reading 'Reformed Dogmatics' by Herman Bavinck

Working my way through Bavinck's mighty four volume Reformed Dogmatics (Volumes 1-4, Baker Academic) has been my big long term reading project. The other day I finished the final volume. Looking back through the blog I notice that the set was delivered in May 2008 (see here). Didn't realise that it's taken me over seven years to get through the whole thing. Although I must admit that my progress has been rather fitful, with months sometimes passing between reads. That said, Bavinck's work needs to be absorbed rather than skimmed if you're going to get the best out of it.

Reformed Dogmatics is easily the best systematic theology I've yet encountered. It puts Berkhof and Reymond in the shade and is far better than Hodge. Right across the whole gamut of systematics  RD is marked by fresh and insightful exegesis, sensitivity to the flow of biblical revelation, awareness of the doctrinal heritage of the church, and deep theological reflection. The work is an organic whole; a mighty exposition of the being, persons, will  and acts of the triune God. 

In an era of the theology tweet and bite sized books for busy pastors, Bavinck offers something substantial, profound and satisfying. His approach is thoroughly presuppositional. Bavinck begins with God and ends with him. He is presented as the Alpha and Omega of theology, it's self-revealing source and ultimate goal. Here is a work of theology as faith seeking understanding that is designed to shape our minds in the light of God's Word, move our hearts to worship in response to God's Ways, and stir our wills to be about God's Work. If pastors aspire to be pastor-theologians for the sake of the people of God, they would do well to study Reformed Dogmatics. Let the man himself define what he means by dogmatic theology:  

Dogmatics is the system of the knowledge of God as he has revealed himself in Christ; it is the system of the Christian religion. And the essence of the Christian religion consists in the reality that the creation of the Father, ruined by sin, is restored in the death of the Son of God and re-created by the grace of the Holy Spirit into a kingdom of God. Dogmatics shows us how God, who is all-sufficient in himself, nevertheless glorifies himself in his creation, which, even when torn apart by sin, is gathered up again in Christ. (Eph 1:10). It describes for us God, always God from beginning to end - God in his being, God in his creation, God against sin, God in Christ, God breaking down all resistance through the Holy Spirit and guiding the whole of creation back to the objective he decreed for it: the glory of his name. Dogmatics, therefore, is not a dull science. It is a theodicy, a doxology of all God's virtues and perfections, a hymn of adoration and thanksgiving, a "glory to God in the highest" (Luke 2:14). (RD Volume 1, p. 112)

From Volume 1-4 Bavinck unfolds the great drama of creation, ruin, redemption and renewal. He constantly returns to the thought that God in his grace has not abandoned the world that he made in rescuing it from sin. Rather, by grace he redeems, restores, and perfects it. The climax of his eschatological vision is not the believer dying and going to heaven, but the new creation.

The state of glory will be no mere restoration of the state of nature, but a re-formation that, thanks to the power of Christ, transforms all matter into form, all potency into actuality, and presents the entire creation before the face of God, brilliant in unfading splendor and blossoming in a springtime of eternal youth. (RD Volume 4, p. 720).   

See here for blog posts on various aspects of RD.  My next 'big read' will be The Christian Faith: A Systematic Theology for Pilgrims on the Way, by Michael Horton, Zondervan. Our people bought me this to mark my 10th anniversary in the pastorate in 2013, but I've been keeping it until I'd finished reading Bavinck. It's always good to have a 'biggie' on the go. In my formative years as a preacher I read Preaching and Preachers,  by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. I was struck by his counsel,  

Time must be found for reading, and we turn now to the more intellectual type of reading. The first is theology. There is no greater mistake than to think that you finish with theology when you leave a seminary. The preacher should continue to read theology as long as he is alive. The more he reads the better and there are many authors and systems to be studied. I have known men in the ministry, and men in various other walks of life who stop reading when they finish their training. They think they have acquired all they need; they have their lecture notes, and nothing further is necessary. The result is that they vegetate and become quite useless. Keep on reading; and read the big works. (Preaching and Preachers by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Hodder and Stoughton, 1985, p. 177).

You can't get much bigger or grander in scope and scale than Herman Bavinck's great magnum opus. Delve into his Reformed Dogmatics. Don't just take my word for it. It's Doctor's orders and will do you good. 

Long time no see, Herman

You know what it's like. You've got an old friend. You keep meaning to meet up with them, but life and stuff keeps getting in the way. Maybe you glance at their Facebook status every now and again. You reminisce about the good old days. Occasionally you almost remember to send them an email, but that's about it. You kind of miss them, but the thought of doing something about it doesn't lodge for long enough in the brain for you to take action. 

I think you know what I mean. Well it's been a bit like that with me and Herman Bavinck of late. At least with me and his Reformed Dogmatics. I've been making good progress and have advanced to the final volume in the set. The bookmark is currently resting at the beginning of chapter 3 Justification, and it hasn't moved from there for months, probably. I've read stuff in the meantime, but RD has been sadly neglected. 

The frivolity of summer is not conducive to reading Bavinck. You can't take a weighty volume of  RD to the beach. The dogmatician doesn't do small, bitesize chapters you can read in chunks here and there. You have to make time to for some deep, prayerful and meditative study if you are going to get the best out of Bavinck's work.

And that's what I'm going to try and do. It's about time I was reacquainted with the Dutch divine.

 "Hey, Herman you were saying about justification....".

"Oh yes..." '...justification...that gracious judicial act of God by which he acquits humans of all the guilt and punishment of sin and confers on them the right to eternal life... But this benefit - the complete forgiveness of sin - is so immense that the natural human intellect cannot grasp and believe it.'

"It's been too long, old friend, too long."

Herman Bavinck on Regeneration in Christ

I recently finished reading Herman Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatics, Volume 3: Sin and Salvation in Christ. His treatment of Christ's person and work is biblically insightful, theologically orthodox and spiritually enriching. Bavinck places his discussion of christology (the doctrine of Christ) and soteriology (the doctrine of salvation) in the context of the covenants of redemption and grace (see here). He constantly draws attention to the trinitarian dimensions of God's saving grace. "All the benefits of salvation that the Father has awarded to the church from eternity and the Son acquired in time are at the same time gifts of the Holy Spirit." (p. 593).

Towards the end of the final chapter of Volume 3, entitled The Order of Salvation, Bavinck touches on the relationship between regeneration and union with Christ (p. 591f). There is sometimes a lack of clarity on this issue in Reformed Theology. Some argue that the Spirit's work of regeneration, or at least effectual calling, of which regeneration is a component, is what unites us savingly to Christ. John Murray argues for that view in his Redemption Accomplished and Applied, p. 165. Robert Reymond hardly says a word about regeneration and union with Christ in his New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith, p. 708-710. He concentrates almost solely on the proper ordering of regeneration and faith in the process of salvation. With more insight, others insist that regeneration is the work of God by which sinners are made alive in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. Consider the words of Sinclair Ferguson 

"Every facet of the application of Christ's work ought to be related to the way in which the Spirit unites us to Christ himself, and viewed directly as issuing from personal fellowship with him. The dominant motif and architectonic principle of the order of salvation should therefore be union with Christ in the Spirit." (Sinclair B. Ferguson, The Holy Spirit, Contours of Christian Theology, IVP, 1996, p. 100).

In his discussion of the subject Bavinck makes careful distinctions between salvation decreed, salvation accomplished and salvation applied. For that reason he disagrees with the notion of 'eternal justification' (p. 591). Nevertheless, he is at pains to insist that all the benefits of salvation are have their foundation in the eternal counsel of God (p. 590). "Hence already in eternity an imputation of Christ to his own and of the church to Christ took place. Between them an exchange occurred  and a mystical union was formed that underlies their realization in history, indeed produces and leads to them"(p. 590).

This governing thought enables Bavinck to stress that all the blessings of the covenant of grace, granted to the church by God in eternity are bestowed by Christ, on the basis of his redeeming work. He asks, "How else could we receive the Holy Spirit, the grace of regeneration, and the gift of faith, all of which were acquired by Christ and are his possession?" Then the dogmatician says, "It is not therefore the case that we first repent or are reborn by the Holy Spirit and receive faith without Christ, in order to go to with them to Christ, to accept his righteousness, and thus are justified by Christ. But just as all the benefits of grace come to us from the good pleasure of the Father, so they now proceed from the fullness of Christ (p. 590)."

Regeneration, then proceeds from Christ, who unites his people to himself and gives them new life by his Spirit. This is not to say that the child of God is eternally regenerate any more than he is eternally justified. Bavinck acknowledges this, saying, "Yet just as earlier we made a distinction between the decree and its fulfilment, so here we must make a distinction between the acquisition and the application of salvation (p. 591). "The application of salvation by Christ is effected in this world of time as the Saviour gives life to those who were formerly dead in sin by his regenerating power. 

This emphasis on regeneration in Christ is also found in the Irish Articles (1615), the principal author of which was James Ussher. Article 33 reads, 

All God's elect are in their time inseparably united unto Christ by the effectual and vital influence of the Holy Ghost, derived from him as from the head unto every true member of his mystical body. And being thus made one with Christ, they are truly regenerated and made partakers of him and all his benefits.

In his series on Great Doctrines of the Bible, Volume 2, D. M. Lloyd-Jones has a chapter on A Child of God and in Christ. Arguing from Ephesians 1:3 and John 1:16 he reasons that,

 we are constrained to say that even regeneration itself...is, logically, an outcome of our union with Christ (p.103). You cannot be born again without being in Christ; you are born again because you are in Christ. The moment you are in Him you are born again (p. 106).

Reformed theology at its best has insisted in the words of the apostle Paul that in regeneration God "made us alive together with Christ" (Ephesians 2:5) by the power of the Holy Spirit. "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Peter 1:3). 

Herman Bavinck on the Covenant of Redemption

The idea that the Father entered into a 'covenant of redemption' with the Son in eternity is a staple of Reformed covenant theology. As typically expressed, the Father appointed the Son Mediator and Surety of the covenant of grace and promised him a glorious reward on completion of his redemptive work. This construction is found in the work of early covenant theologian, Johannes Cocceius, seventeenth century Orthodox Reformed divines, old Princeton theologians, Charles and A. A. Hodge, and more recently, Louis Berkhof. 

However, Robert Letham complains that as traditionally explained the 'covenant of redemption' is open to a number of criticisms. It seems to entail the eternal subordination of the Son to the Father, and as the pactum salutis (pact of salvation) is taken only to concern the Father and the Son, with little or no mention of the Holy Spirit, it is sub-trinitarian.  Indeed, in his The Work of Christ, (endnote 34, p. 254), Letham points out that in his Outlines of Theology, (p. 371-372), A. A. Hodge makes no reference at all to the Holy Spirit in his discussion of the covenant of redemption. Charles Hodge defends the notion of the Father entering into a pre-temporal pact with the Son by invoking the doctrine of the Trinity (Systematic Theology Volume 2, p. 359). But, once more, when it comes to the substance of the 'covenant of redemption', the doctrine is unfolded in terms of an arrangement between the Father and the Son. The Father is said to give the Holy Spirit to the Son to facilitate the work of redemption, but that is about as far as it goes. Louis Berkhof's treatment of the 'covenant of redemption' likewise pays scant attention to the role of the Holy Spirit, (Systematic Theology, p. 265-271). He defines the compact thus, the agreement between the Father, giving the Son as Head of the elect, and the Son, voluntarily taking the place of those whom the Father had given Him. (Italics original, p. 271). As Berkhof's definition makes no mention of the Holy Spirit, it clearly falls foul of the principle that both the internal and external acts of the Trinity are undivided. On this basis the 'covenant of redemption' in its traditionally stated form is highly problematic.

Now we come to Herman Bavinck. The Dutch dogmatician is critical of some aspects of the construction of the pactum salutis found in Orthodox Reformed divines such as Cocceious. But he nevertheless sees a clear biblical basis for the idea that in eternity the Father appointed the Son as Mediator (amongst other texts, he cites: Isaiah 42:1, John 6:38-40, 10:18, 1 Peter 1:20, Revelation 13:8). As he develops his teaching on the 'covenant of redemption', Bavinck is keen to set out the trinitarian character of the doctrine,

The pact of salvation makes known to us the relationships and life of the three persons in the Divine Being as a covenantal life, a life of consummate self-consciousness and freedom. Here, within the Divine Being, the covenant flourishes to the full.... The greatest freedom and the most perfect agreement coincide. The work of salvation is an undertaking of three persons in which all cooperate and each performs a special task... It is the triune God alone, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, who together conceive, determine, carry out and complete the entire work of salvation. (Reformed Dogmatics Volume 3, p. 214-215).

The pact of salvation between the persons of the Trinity in eternity is the foundation of the saving acts of the triune God in the history of redemption. 

All the grace that is extended to the creation after the fall comes to it from the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit. The Son appeared immediately after the fall, as Mediator, as the second and final Adam who occupies the place of the first, restores what the latter corrupted and accomplishes what he failed to do. And the Holy Spirit immediately acted as the Paraclete, the one applying the salvation acquired by Christ. (RD. 3, p. 217). 

And so it is that under both Old and New Testament dispensations that the Father saves his people by the redeeming work of the Son, applied to them by the Holy Spirit. "There is one faith, one Mediator, one way of salvation, and one covenant of grace." (RD. 3, p. 217).  

Bavinck's treatment of the 'covenant of redemption' is thoroughly grounded in Scripture. He takes into account the trinitarian dimensions of the doctrine, relating the eternal pactum salutis between Father, Son and Holy Spirit to the historical fulfilment of the work of redemption. John Murray is not altogether happy in speaking of pre-temporal 'covenant' between the persons of the Trinity, preferring the designation 'inter-trinitarian economy of salvation.' (Collected Writings of John Murray, Volume 2, p. 130). But, as his suggested rewording implies, he is in full agreement with Bavinck's trinitarian emphasis, 

The title ['inter-trinitarian economy of salvation'] is inclusive enough to comprise all aspects of the economy, eternal and temporal, pre-temporal design and fulfilment in time and in the ages to come... After all, our study of the plan of salvation will not produce abiding fruit unless the plan captivates our devotion to the triune God in the particularity of the grace which each person bestows in the economy of redemption, and in the particularity of the relationship constituted by the amazing grace of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The fellowship of the living God is the fellowship of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. (CW. 2, p. 131). 

As set out by Bavinck and Murray (despite the latter's reservations concerning the use of covenant language when it comes to the pactum salutis), the 'covenant of redemption' demands a place in biblically faithful Reformed theology. In eternity and time salvation is of the Father, by the Son and through the Holy Spirit. 

Juxtaposition: Herman Bavinck on God's fatherly providence and Thomas Hardy's blighted star

The lives of Herman Bavinck (1854-1921) and Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) intersected the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Both men were affected in different ways by the upheavals in thought and life that characterised that turbulent period in world history. As their respective portraits show, the Dutch Reformed theologian and the English novelist and poet shared a common a penchant for extravagant facial hair. But Bavinck and Hardy had very different outlooks upon life. In this post I want to try and bring Hardy's bleak determinism into dialogue with Bavinck's account of the fatherly providence of God. 

Reading Bavinck on providence in Reformed Dogmatics Volume 2: God and Creation (Baker Academic, 2006) put me in mind of Thomas Hardy. The theologian makes a pointed distinction between fate and God's providential rule of the universe. In her excellent biography, Thomas Hardy: Time-Torn Man (Penguin, 2007), Claire Tomlain devotes a chapter to Hardy's fatalistic outlook as it found expression in his novels. The chapter is entitled The Blighted Star, after Tess' complaint in Tess of the D'Urbevilles that this planet is a "blighted star" due to the frustrations and hardships of life. 

As a young man Thomas Hardy came under the influence of Henry Moule, the evangelical vicar of Fordington. When revival broke out under Moule's ministry in 1855, Hardy seems to have been affected. While training as an architect he began to study the New Testament in the original Greek and was a regular church goer. But this early piety was not to last. By 1866 he no longer accepted many of the key teachings of the Church. Reading the liberal theology of Essays and Reviews and the writings of the agnostic Thomas Huxley helped to unsettle his beliefs. On attempting to make a living as a writer, he became acquainted with Leslie Stephen and his atheistic fellow-travellers. 

Tomlain cites the perceptive comment of Irving Howe on the impact that his loss of faith had on Hardy's outlook, 

Because Hardy remained enough of a Christian to believe that purpose courses through the universe but not enough of a Christian to believe that purpose is benevolent or the attribute of a particular Being, he had to make his plots convey the oppressiveness of fatality without positing an agency determining the course of fate... The result was that he often seems to be coercing his plots...and sometimes...he seems to be potting against his own characters. 

This can be seen, for example in The Mayor of Casterbridge, where the impersonal forces of fate seem to conspire to bring down Michael Henchard. The erstwhile mayor dies a lonely and hopeless death. He gives up on life because of the odds fixed against him by 'that ingenious machinery contrived by the gods for reducing human possibilities of happiness to a minimum.' The final words of the novel, found on the lips of Henchard's supposed daughter, Elizabeth-Jane are devoid of hope as she reflects that, 'happiness is the occasional episode in a general drama of pain.' On reviewing Jude the Obscure, one of Hardy's most bitterly anti-Christian novels, Edmund Gosse wondered, 'What has Providence done to Mr. Hardy that he should rise up in the arable land of Wessex and shake his fist at his Creator?'

Mention of Providence brings me to Herman Bavinck's treatment of the doctrine in Reformed Dogmatics. His single chapter consideration of the subject comprises the fourth and final part of RD Vol. 2, appropriately entitled God's Fatherly Care. The theologian begins by marshalling a vast array of biblical materials. He concludes that providence is God's kingly work of upholding and governing the world that he has made in accordance with his eternal plan and purpose. "His absolute power and perfect love, accordingly, are the true object of faith in providence reflected in Holy Scripture." (p. 593). Bavinck distinguishes the divine foreordination of all things from fate. Pantheism, which fails to differentiate between the transcendent Creator and the creation, inevitably collapses into fatalism,

On its premise there is no existence other than the existence of nature; no higher power than that which operates in the world in accordance with ironclad law; no other and better life than that for which the materials are present in this visible creation. For a time people may flatter themselves with the idealistic hope that the world will perfect itself by an imminent series of developments, but soon this optimism turns into pessimism, this idealism into materialism. (p. 599).

As Howe pointed out, Hardy's fatalism was a twisted and ruined vestige of his earlier Christian belief in divine providence. He felt that life must have a purpose, even if that purpose is a pantheistic impersonal force that is out to get us. But as Bavinck makes clear, citing Augustine, God's providential ordering of the world is not "a blind coercive power, outside of and in opposition to our will, for 'the fact is that our choices fall within the order of the causes, which is known for certain to God and is contained in his foreknowledge.'" (p. 600). Christian theology recognises a concurrence between the providence of God and the free actions of his human creatures. "Neither are the secondary causes merely instruments, organs, inanimate automata, but they are genuine causes with a nature, vitality, spontaneity, manner of working,  and law of their own." (p. 614). We are not, like Hardy's characters, the unwilling victims of a malign deterministic force. We are the free subjects of God's providential rule. As the Westminster Confession of Faith states,

God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established. (III:I) 

'New Atheist' Richard Dawkins goes further than Hardy, with the latter's belief that 'purpose courses through the universe'. Consistent with his unbelief, Dawkins denies that there can be any purpose in life. Without God there can be none. 

Such a universe would be neither good or bad in intention. It would manifest no intentions of any kind. In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, or any justice. The universe that we observe has precicely the properties that we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, but blind, pitiless indifference." Daily Telegraph, 10 May 1995. 

The biblical teaching on providence set out so helpfully by Bavinck preserves us from the hopeless pessimism of unbelief. "In all circumstances of life, it gives us good confidence in our faithful God and Father that he will provide whatever we need for body and soul and that he will turn to our good whatever adversity he sends us in this sad world, since he is able to do this as almighty God and desires to do this as a faithful Father." (p. 619). 

Herman Bavinck on Human Destiny

I'm steadily working my way though Reformed Dogmatics Volume 2: God and Creation by Herman Bavinck. I have to say that Bavink's is the most remarkable and satisfying work of systematic theology that I have yet to read. He really puts Berkhof and Reymond in the shade. 

I've just finished his treatment of the doctrine of man, which is divided into three chapters, Human Origins, Human Nature and Human Destiny. Briefly, in the first of the three chapters Bavinck interacts with Darwinism and sets out the biblical teaching on the origin of man and the unity of the human race. Then we come to his discussion of human nature. The theologian disputes the Roman Catholic view that man was made in a 'state of nature' with the capability of achieving the image of God and with it life everlasting by meritorious good works. Instead, Bavinck advocates the scriptural position advocated by the Reformers that man was originally created in the image and likeness of God. 

The image is not located in one aspect of human nature, such as the soul. Rather,  "the whole human being is image and likeness of God, in soul and body, in all human faculties, powers and gifts. Nothing in humanity is excluded from God's image; it stretches as far as our humanity does and and constitutes our humanness." (p. 561). So much for the origins and nature of man, but what of his destiny? That's the bit I really want to concentrate on in this post.

Yes, God created human beings in his image. But that does not mean that in Adam and Eve humanity achieved its fullest potential. The goal of humanity was everlasting life in the presence of God. That destiny could not be achieved on the basis of merit or reward. God owed even unfallen humanity nothing. Eternal life is a gift freely bestowed by God upon his human image bearers, not a just desert awarded for effort. 

On what basis, then did God promise to grant humanity the rich blessing of eternal life?  According to Bavinck this is where the so-called "covenant of works" comes into its own. It is by means of a covenant that the transcendent and infinitely glorious Creator relates to his human creatures. He voluntarily bound himself to humanity by entering into this covenantal relationship with them. Bavinck finds direct biblical evidence for the 'Adamic covenant' in Hosea 6:7 (ESV). He argues cogently in favour of the translation, "like Adam they transgressed the covenant".  But he asserts that regarding the arrangement with Adam as a covenant is not solely dependent on the Hosea text. Even if the word "covenant" were not used, then "one may doubt the word provided the matter is safe" (p. 569). When God calls people into a relationship with himself, laying obligations upon them and obliging himself to them, then that is, in essence, a covenant. Followers of John Murray's view concerning the "Adamic administration"  would do well to consider Bavinck's arguments on this point.     

Accordingly, Bavinck sees Adam's life in the Garden of Eden as a probationary period. If for that period Adam had continued in obedience to the command not to eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, then God would have bestowed upon Adam and all humanity in him the blessing of everlasting life. Adam stood in a federal or representative relation to the rest of humanity. His actions for good or ill would affect the destiny of the whole human race. Bavinck appeals to the broken symmetries between Adam and Christ in Romans 5:12-21 and 1 Corinthians 15:22 to justify his case. 

When it comes to the fulfilment of human destiny in Christ, the Saviour does not simply restore his own to the position of Adam before the fall. "He positions us not at the beginning, but at the end of the journey that Adam  had to complete." (p. 573). Adam was capable of choosing to sin. He was not immortal. Should he sin, he would die. In Christ believers will be raised immortal to sin no more, 1 Corinthians 15:45-49. As the theologian elaborates in a later volume of Reformed Dogmatics, 

Christ was the second Adam. He came not only to bear our punishment for us but also to obtain for us the righteousness and life that Adam had to secure by his obedience. He delivered us from guilt and punishment and placed us at the end of the road Adam had to walk, not at the beginning. He gives us much more than we lost in Adam, not only the forgiveness of sin and release from punishment but also and immediately - in faith - the not-being-able to sin and not-being-able to die. (Reformed Dogmatics Volume 3: Sin and Salvation in Christ, Baker Academic, p. 395).

In him the tribes of Adam boast,

More blessings than their father lost. 

(Jesus Shall Reign, Isaac Watts) 

Herman Bavinck on Creation

I recently finished reading Bavinck's treatment of the doctrine of creation (Reformed Dogmatics Volume 2: God and Creation, Baker Academic 2006, p. 473-507). Very helpful it was too.

Bavinck's treatment of creation is rooted in his doctrine of the Trinity. Indeed, he states that "If God were not triune creation would not be possible (p. 420)". The triune God is the communicating God. The Father communicated the full image of God to the Son. If God was unable to communicate himself to his Son he would be even less able to communicate himself to the creature.

Creation was a concerted act of the Trinity. The Father made all things by his Word and through his Spirit. The unity in diversity of the created order is testimony to the unity in diversity of the one Creator God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The divine goal in creating the universe was the glorification of his own name, Romans 11:36.

The eternal God made the world not in time but with time. Time is the necessary form of the finite. The finite creation is in the process of becoming, while the infinite God is pure being. Creation entailed no change in God. He did not become active in making the world with the implication the he was inactive before the creation. Even without the creation God was not idle. He is pure actuality with an infinite fullness of  communicative life in his triune being. The act of creation involved no effort on God's part and did not exhaust his power or wisdom. "He can act while He reposes, and repose when He acts (p. 428)."

Although Bavinck's four volume dogmatics were originally published in the late 19th/early 20th centuries, Bavinck's theology is remarkably up-to-date. He wrestles with the relationship between ancient near eastern literature and the Genesis account, still very much a live issue today. He does not neglect to address the theory of evolution. Detailed attention is given to the challenge of the science of geology to the Bible's depiction of the creation of the earth.

Bavinck's handling of Genesis 1 is interesting. Without positing a "Gap Theory", which he rejects, he holds that "the creation of heaven and earth in Genesis 1:1 and the unformed state of the earth in Genesis 1:2 are anterior to the first day." The work of the six creation days is that of separation and adornment. Day one did not include the original act of the creation of all things out of nothing (p. 478-480).

On day four (Genesis 1:14-19), Bavinck argues that the appearance of the lights in the heavens, "does not imply that the masses of matter of which the planets are composed were only then called into being, but only that all these planets would on this day become what they henceforth are to be to the earth (p. 481)." This anticipates the view of Edgar Andrews. The scientist suggests that Genesis is using phenomenological language at this point rather than depicting the moment when the sun, moon and stars came into existence. (See Who Made God?, EP, 2009, p. 106).

What of the theologian's view of the six days of creation? He rejects an attempt to co-ordinate the days Genesis 1 with lengthy geological periods. Not for him either what would nowadays be called the "framework hypothesis" that sees the creation days in terms of ideal or logical order rather that chronological sequence. So, he's a "twenty-four hourer" right? Not exactly. Bavinck holds that it is "not likely" that the divine actions depicted in each of the six days of creation took place within the span of a few hours. Rather, what we have here is the "workdays of God", or "the time in which God was at work creating (p. 500)". This does not amount to "theistic evolution", but an assertion of the singularity of the six days of creation.

Bavinck regards estimates of the age of the earth amounting to millions of years as "fabulous" - by which he means not "wonderful" but "incredible" (p. 490). But, he admits the Bible provides no exact data as to the age of the earth (p. 506). Changes to the planet made by the Great Flood need to be taken into account when it comes to understanding the geological  strata.

The dogmatician was aware of developments in the scientific world. But he was not willing to reinterpret the Bible to harmonise its teaching with naturalistic views of  origins. Indeed, he thinks that theologians are misguided when they constantly yield ground in an effort to co-ordinate biblical teaching with scientific theories,

As the science of divine and eternal things, theology must be patient until the science that contradicts it has made a deeper and broader study of its field and, as happens in most cases, corrects itself. In that matter theology upholds its dignity and honour more effectively than by constantly yielding and adapting itself to the opinions of the day. (p. 507) 

Bavinck on The Divine Counsel

Pelagianism scatters flowers on graves, turns death into an angel, regards sin as mere weakness, lectures on the uses of adversity, and considers this the best possible world. Calvinism has no use for such drivel. It refuses to be hoodwinked. It tolerates no such delusion, takes full account of the seriousness of life, champions the rights of the Lord of lords, and humbly bows in adoration before the inexplicable sovereign will of God. (Reformed Dogmatics, Volume 2: God and Creation, Herman Bavinck, p. 394).  

I'm still making my way through Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatics. His treatment of the Divine Counsel in Volume 2: God and Creation is outstanding. He begins by delineating the biblical teaching. Bavinck cites dozens of proofs texts, but he does so in a thoughtful way. His handling of the biblical materials shows that the dogmatician is sensitive to the unfolding progress biblical revelation. He takes into account the different aspects of the New Testament's teaching on the sovereign purpose of God; the divine "will", "counsel", "purpose", "foreknowledge", and so on. 

True to his own theological method (see here), Bavinck doesn't stop there. Dogmatics is not simply concerned to assemble the biblical data on a given subject. The task of the theologian is to reflect on the Bible's teaching and think through its implications. And so Bavinck delves into the Pelagian controversy. He demonstrates that Pelagianism, which asserts the free will of man over and against the sovereign will of God, fails to do justice to the Bible's teaching. The theologian offers a robustly Augustinian view of the divine counsel, defending the absolute sovereignty of God. However, he is not afraid to offer some correctives to traditional Augustinian/Reformed conceptions of predestination. Bavinck criticises both infralapsarianism and supralapsarianism. Both systems fail to take into account the what he calls the "organic interconnectivity" of the counsel of God, "neither the supralapsarian not the infralapsarian view of predestination is capable of incorporating within its perspective the fullness and riches of the truth of Scripture and of satisfying theological thinking." (p. 391).

Bavinck questions the idea that God chose to save the elect in order to glorify his grace and to condemn the reprobate in order to glorify his justice. He points out that all of God's attributes - his grace and justice will be fully revealed and glorified in the new creation. While it is true that both election and reprobation redound to the glory of God, that is not what made the election of some and the reprobation of others necessary. Election and reprobation can only be explained by reference to the sovereign will of God. We can go no further than that. (See p. 389, 391-392).

The elect are chosen in Christ, but this does not mean that Christ is the meritorious cause of election, "The Son did not move the Father to love; electing love arose from the Father himself." (Bavinck cites John 3:16, 2 Timothy 1:9 & Ephesians 1:4, p. 401-402). The elect consists of particular individuals, chosen by grace. But, explains Bavinck, "in Scripture the elect are not viewed separately, that is atomistically, but  as a single organism. They constitute the people of God, the body of Christ, the temple of the Holy Spirit. They are, accordingly elect in Christ (Eph. 1:4), to be members of his body. Hence, both Christ and the church are included in the decree of predestination." (p. 402-403).

Furthermore Bavinck reasons,

Its is not that Christ was thereby the ground and foundation of election; but the election of the church is the very first benefit bestowed on the church; and even this benefit already occurred in union with Christ, and above all it has its goal, not as its foundation, that all other benefits - rebirth, faith and so forth - will be imparted to the church by Christ. In this sense, then, the election of Christ logically precedes our own. (p. 404) 

It might be added that if the divine counsel is the counsel of the Triune God (which it surely is), then the Son together with the Father and the Holy Spirit is the one who elects and the one in whom we are elected for salvation. 

Some object that the Augustinian doctrine on sovereign election in Christ is detrimental to evangelism and the free offer of the gospel. But Bavinck counters that it is Pelagianism that leaves the sinner without hope. It teaches that the virtuous are chosen because of virtue. Where does that leave poor sinners? "The purpose of election is not - as it has been so often proclaimed - to turn off the many but to invite all to participate in the riches of God's grace in Christ. No one has a right to believe that he or she is reprobate, for everyone is sincerely and urgently called to believe in Christ with a view to salvation." (p. 402).

In this post I offer but a rough sketch of Bavinck's deeply biblical, richly nuanced, and God-glorifying teaching on election. Dogmatics should aim at the same effect as Scripture. Theology should lead to doxology, Romans 11:33-36. That is certainly the case with Herman Bavinck's The Reformed Dogmatics. 

Bavinck on faith, reason and theology

I'm steadily working my way through Reformed Dogmatics Volume 2: God and Creation, by Herman Bavinck, Baker Academic, 2006. In his treatment of the doctrine of the Trinity the theologian defends the use of extrabiblical terminology in clarifying and explaining the teaching of the Bible. The trouble is that false teachers cite Scripture as well as the orthodox, so issues won't be settled simply by both sides trading proof texts. When the friendly neighbourhood "Jehovah's Witnesses" turns up on your doorstep you may tell them, "Ah, but we believe that Jesus is the Son of God." But they will respond, "So do we as a matter of fact." Then it comes down to what is meant by "Jesus is the Son of God". Is he the greatest creature that God ever made, or is he fully God, equal to the Father in his divine being and glory? The same problem was faced by the early church in responding to the challenge of Arianism. Hence the Nicene Creed's statement that the Son is homoousios - of the same essence as the Father. The Church was forced to resort to extra-biblical terminology in order to defend the divine identity of Jesus Christ. 

It has often been the case that false teachers have resisted the use of non-biblical language in defining what the Bible says. Arians, Socinians and "Jehovah's Witnesses" tend to be strict biblicists. They protest that they base their teaching solely on the words of Scripture. However, therein lies their subterfuge. They undermine biblical truth by emptying Scripture expressions of their true meaning. They will happily say that Jesus is the Son of God, but they deny that as the Son of God he is of the same essence as the Father. 

Bavinck makes it clear that the church's use of extrabiblical terms does not involve the introduction of newly minted extrabiblical teaching. Rather such language is needed to defend the truth against all error. He makes the interesting point,

Under the guise of being scriptural, biblical theology has always strayed farther away from Scripture, while ecclesiastical orthodoxy, with its extrabiblical terminology, has been consistently vindicated as scriptural. (p. 297).

So, the church needed to resort to other than biblical language in order to safeguard the integrity of biblical truth. But, more positively, Bavinck insists that use of extrabiblical language is essential to the church's constructive theological task,

Scripture after all has not been given us simply, parrotlike to repeat it, but to process it in our own minds and to reproduce it in our own words. Jesus and the apostles used it in that way. They not only quoted Scripture verbatim, but also by a process of reasoning drew inferences from it. Scripture is neither a book of statutes for a dogmatic textbook but the foundational source of theology. As the Word of God, not only its exact words but also the inferences legitimately drawn from it have binding authority. Furthermore, reflection on the truth of Scripture and the theological activity related to it is in no way possible without the use of extrabiblical terminology... Involved in the use of such terms, therefore is the Christian's right of independent reflection and theology's right to exist. (p. 296)

What Bavinck is saying here is in accordance with the principle set out in the Westminster Confession of Faith, 

The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down in Scripture, or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture (I:VI) [Emphasis added]. 

Theology is an act of holy reason. It involves faith seeking understanding by thoughtfully reflecting on God's self-revelation in Holy Scripture. Bavinck gives further attention to this matter Reformed Dogmatics Volume 1: Prolegomena, Baker Academic 2003, p. 617ff. Without recognition of this point not only theology, but also preaching would prove impossible. For what is preaching but an attempt to explain and apply the teaching of the Bible? We cannot do that simply by quoting a string of Bible texts, one after another. The preacher has to elucidate the meaning of his text by using extrabiblical language. He has to work out how his text relates to the teaching of other portions of Scripture. He must reflect on how believers should live in the light of the passage he is expounding. These "good and necessary consequences  deduced from Scripture" are part and parcel of the whole counsel of God to which the whole people of God need to be exposed. That is one of the reasons why "the preaching of the Word of God is the Word of God." (Second Helvetic Confession Chapter I.) Thus the preacher's task entails 'holy reasoning' akin to the efforts demanded of the theologian. Indeed, preaching is nothing less than 'theology on fire'. 

Bavinck words on the relationship between faith and reason have resonance for would-be pastor-theologians,

Believing is the natural breath of the children of God. Their submission to the Word of God is not slavery but freedom. In that sense faith is not a sacrifice of the intellect but mental health (sanitas mentis). Faith, therefore, does not relive the Christian of the desire to study and reflect; rather it spurs them on. Nature is not destroyed by regeneration but restored. (RD Vol 1, p. 616-617). 

Herman Bavinck on the essence of error

In the light of reading Alister McGrath's book on Heresy (see my review), I was interested to come across this thought from Herman Bavinck,

Now in the confession of the Trinity we hear the heartbeat of the Christian religion: every error results from, or upon deeper reflection is traceable to, a departure in the doctrine of the Trinity. (Reformed Dogmatics Volume 2: God and Creation , Baker Academic, p. 288, 2006

According to Luther, "The cross tests everything".  But the cross only functions as the definitive revelation of God and an act of redeeming grace in the context of the doctrine of the Trinity. If Christ was not God the Son, his sacrificial death did not disclose the fullness of God's love for the world. If Christ was not God the Son, his sacrificial death would not have been sufficient to atone for the sins of the world.

As the New Testament bears witness, Calvary involved the whole Trinity. Christ the Son offered himself to God the Father through the eternal Spirit (Hebrews 9:14). As such the cross tests everything. 

What we believe concerning God and ourselves must be assessed in the light of the saving work of the triune God at the cross. Arguing from resolution to plight, that it took the death of the Son of God in his humanity to save us demonstrates how how seriously God takes sin. Arguing from plight to resolution, that for us to be saved the Son of God had to take a human nature and die demonstrates that we could never hope save ourselves. God commends his love to us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us and God's love is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit whom he has given us, Romans 5:8, 5. 

Heresy distorts the doctrine of God and devastates the doctrine of salvation. A low view of Christ will lead to a light view of sin and a light view of sin will lead to a low view of Christ. As John Owen once wrote, "A Socinan Christ for a Pelagian man". We believe in nothing less than a Nicean Christ for an Augustinian man. 

On reading Bavinck's proof texts - an easy method for slackers

I don't know about you, but when it comes to reading books that include a large number of lists of proof text references, my instinct is to skip the list and not bother to look up the relevant Bible passages. Reaching for a Bible and flicking through hundreds of pages to pursue multiple references to texts in Genesis, Numbers, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, Romans etc. is too much like hard work. However not looking up the relevant texts makes me feel guilty for being such a slacker. Besides, what we want from a theologian is theology that has been mined from the Bible, not simply a handy summary of Reformed doctrine that has little to do with the text of Scripture. John Frame rightly says,

after all has been said, theology really cannot do without proof-texts. Any theology that seeks accord with Scripture... has an obligation to show where it gets its scriptural warrant. It may not simply claim to be based on "general scriptural principles", it must show where Scripture teaches the doctrine in question. (The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God, John Frame, P&R, 1987, p. 197)

Bavinck includes many lists of Bible references in his Reformed Dogmatics. Currently I'm about a third of the way through Volume 2, God and Creation. I've just started Chapter 6, on The Holy Trinity. The theologian gives consideration to 'Old Testament seeds' of the doctrine of the Trinity. He carefully sets out his view that while the Old Testament may lack the fullness of the New Testament's revelation of the triune God, we may find "components that are of the highest significance for the doctrine of the Trinity" in the Old Testament (p. 261). Dozens of texts are adduced with regard to God's name, his work in creation by Word and Spirit and the angel of of Lord. Bavinck is a competent guide to the Scriptures to which he refers his readers. It is evident that he has given careful thought to the meaning of the passages cited. He is aware of differing exegetical approaches to the texts in question. Failure to pursue his lists of Bible verses would have deprived me of the wonder of encountering afresh God as Trinity in the pages of the Old Testament.

Anyway, the post's title promises an easy method of looking up proof texts. This is my labour-saving suggestion. Rather than arduously flicking your way through a printed copy of Holy Scripture, use an online Bible, such as BibleGateway.com. With the Passage Lookup feature, tap in the reference in abbreviated form. For example Hab 2:5-6. If you want to see a verse in its context, you can even click a button to bring up the whole chapter. It's much quicker (at least for me) to type  abbreviated Bible references than leaf my way through a shiny black leather Bible with elegant gilt-edged pages.

If you have already figured out how to do this for yourself and were looking for an even more simple way of looking up proof texts, then sorry to disappoint you, but as far as I've discovered this is as easy as it gets. Indolence is the mother of invention, but it has its limits. 

Being is becoming in Bavinck

I've just finished reading Bavinck on 'Revelation in Nature and Holy Scripture' in Reformed Dogmatics: Volume One. The great Dutch theologian anticipates the language of Karl Barth, who famously suggested that 'God's being is in becoming.' Bavinck rightly relates the being and becoming of God to the enfleshment of Christ,

"The incarnation is the unity of being (ἐγὼ εἰμί, John 8:58), and becoming (σὰρξ ἐγένετο, John 1:14). - p. 380.

Herman Bavinck on Christian Dogmatics

I've recently started reading Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatics Volume One. It really is a remarkable piece of work. The first volume is given over to prologema. Bavinck wrestles with the problem of doing authentically Christian dogmatics in a post-Enlightenment world. Contrary to Schleiermacher, he argues that that dogmatics cannot simply be the product of the religious consciousness of the believer. Dogmatic theology must be based on God's self-revelation in Scripture. He distinguishes his "synthetic-genetic" approach, which takes into account both word and fact in revelation, from Charles Hodge's "inductive method". Hodge tended to view the task of theology in terms of collecting and arranging the facts of Scripture rather like an empirical scientist. Anyway, here is Herman Bavinck's working definition of Christian Dogmatics:

"Dogmatics is the system of the knowledge of God as he has revealed himself in Christ; it is the system of the Christian religion. And the essence of the Christian religion consists in the reality that the creation of the Father, ruined by sin, is restored in the death of the Son of God and re-created by the grace of the Holy Spirit into a kingdom of God. Dogmatics shows us how God, who is all-sufficient in himself, nevertheless glorifies himself in his creation, which, even when torn apart by sin, is gathered up again in Christ. (Eph 1:10). It describes for us God, always God from beginning to end - God in his being, God in his creation, God against sin, God in Christ, God breaking down all resistance through the Holy Spirit and guiding the whole of creation back to the objective he decreed for it: the glory of his name. Dogmatics, therefore, is not a dull science. It is a theodicy, a doxology of all God's virtues and perfections, a hymn of adoration and thanksgiving, a "glory to God in the highest" (Luke 2:14)."

See here for order info.

Herman Bavinck's complete Reformed Dogmatics have arrived

My long awaited order of the complete four volume set of Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatics was delivered yesterday. Baker have done an excellent job in producing four very handsome volumes that would adorn the shelves of any study. I've dipped in here and there and the translation reads really well. But it's the substance of Bavinck's theology that makes this set so valuable. Here he is on the doctrine of the Trinity,

"The doctrine of the Trinity is of incalculable importance for the Christian religion. The entire Christian belief system, all of special revelation, stands or falls with the confession of God's Trinity. It is the core of the Christian faith, the root of all its dogmas, the basic content of the new covenant. It was this religious Christian interest, accordingly, that sparked the development of the doctrine of the Trinity. At stake in this development - let it be said emphatically - was not a metaphysical theory or a philosophical speculation but the essence of the Christian religion itself. This is so strongly felt that all who value being called a Christian recognize and believe in a king of Trinity. The profoundest question implicit in every Christian creed and system f theology is how God can be both one and yet three. Christian truth in all its parts comes into its own to a lesser or greater degree depending on how that question is answered. In the doctrine of the Trinity we feel the heartbeat of God's entire revelation for the redemption of humanity." (Reformed Dogmatics, Volume 2: God and Creation, Baker, 2006, p. 333).

I think I'm going to enjoy reading this thoroughly God-centred dogmatics.

Bavinck's 'Reformed Dogmatics' - the complete set

I've heard so many good things about the new English translation of Herman Bavinck's four volume Reformed Dogmatics. The final volume is due to be published in May, so I thought I'd better hurry up and wait for what's worth waiting for and place an order for the complete set.