Faith Seeking Understanding
Pastor’s Blog Sections
Richard A. Muller, Prolegomena to Theology
An analysis of the Protestant Scholastic prolegomena in Reformed dogmatics. Muller traces the interaction between the medieval sources (Lombard, Thomas, Duns Scotus, Henry of Ghent, etc.), the first generation of Reformers (i.e. Luther, Bullinger, Zwingli, Calvin) and the scholastics Protestants (Ames, Turretin, Owen, Heidegger, etc.).
Pelagius’s Commentary on St Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, tran. Theodore De Bruyn
Pelagius’ verse by verse commentary on Romans.
Peter Martyr Vermigli, The Peter Martyr Library: Philosophical Works - On the Relation of Philosophy to Theology
Peter Martyr Vermigli (1499-1562) was a former Augustinian monk and contemporary of John Calvin who joined the Reformed after careful study of the Bible. He taught at Oxford, Strasburg, and Zurich. He like Luther had received the scholastic training of the day.
Richard Muller, Christ and the Decree: Christology and Predestination in Reformed Theology from Calvin to Perkins
Muller argues that the Reformed scholastics were not rationalists and did not organize their doctrine around a central doctrine, such as predestination. Further, he shows the continuity and discontinuity between Calvin and the third and fourth generation Reformers.
Richard A. Muller, God, Creation, and Providence in the Thought of Jacob Arminius: Sources and Directions of Scholastic Protestantism in the Era of Early Orthodoxy
A scholarly assessment of the development of Arminius’ theology. Muller’s basic argument is that Arminius is part of the third wave of Protestant theologians who attempted to systematize the earlier exegesis of Scripture by the first wave of the Reformers. In so doing, Arminius attempts to appropriate medieval scholastic and Jesuit tools in vocabulary and theological distinctions to help explain some of the inherent theological tension in theology.
Karl Barth, The Theology of Schleiermacher
A careful consideration and critique of Schleiermacher’s canon and theological system by Karl Barth (1886-1968), delivered as lectures in 1924.
John Calvin and Sebastian Castellio, The Secret Providence of God, ed. Paul Helm, trans. Keith Goad
John Calvin’s former friend Sebastian Castellio (1515-1563) wrote, privately published, and circulated among Protestants a letter attacking Calvin’s articulation of the decrees of God. (Calvin divides God’s will into the revealed will of God and the secret will of God or the published and secret decrees [cf. Deut. 29:29]).
Friedrich Schleiermacher, On Religion: Speeches to Its Cultured Despisers
Schleiermacher (1768-1834) attempts to preserve Protestant Christianity from the corrosive effects of materialism by mixing Lutheran pietism with Spinoza and Platonism. He is obviously influenced by dialectic thought but does not appear to be a strict Hegelian.
Gordon J. Wenham, Story as Torah: Reading Old Testament Narrative Ethically
The basic argument of the book is that the “Old Testament narrative books do have a didactic purpose, that is, they are trying to instill both theological truths and ethical ideals into their readers” (3). The ethical ideal of the Old Testament is not merely found in bare conformity to the letter of the law, but is found in the characters imitating God. Since, the characters so often fail at meeting the requirements of the law or the ethical ideal, God must then be a gracious and forgiving God.
William G. T. Shedd, Calvinism: Pure and Mixed
Shedd’s response to the latitudinarian, liberal, and synergistic revisions suggested to the Westminster Confession among Presbyterians in the United States in the late 1800s.