Richard A. Muller, Prolegomena to Theology

in Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: the Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725, vol. 1, 2nd ed.

Baker Books, 2006, 463 pgs.

Summary: 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.).

His basic argument is that scholasticism is a method of developing and teaching a theological system appropriate for the schools. The Reformers, many of whom were scholasticly trained, were forced by polemical and practical necessity to develop theological systems and schools designed for creating and maintaining the Protestant movement. The next generation of the reformed then developed theological systems that were designed to maintain reformed churches through academic training and analysis. The second generation became the Protestant scholastics or the Reformed orthodox. Conceptually both the Reformers and the reformed scholastics were drawing on the theological tradition of the Middle Ages with its rich theological and biblical reflection.

Even as the Protestant orthodox entered into the academic lists, they did not compromise the fundamental epistemological ground of the Reformed insight of Scripture alone. They understood reason and philosophy as the handmaiden of theology and not the mistress. Scripture and scriptural presuppositions (the existence of God as the greatest possible being, creation of the world ex nilhio, the historical nature of the Fall, etc.) remained primary. At the same time the topics of theology were rationally ordered and systematized to maintain and defend the Reformed movement.

Historically the Reformed Scholastics were not bested on rational grounds, either by the Catholics or secularist; however, the rules of engagement among academics shifted as Enlightenment thought swept Western culture. Nature progressively became the exclusive epistemological foundation or interpretation of reality, thus excluding the possibility of Reformed academic participation on the grounds of a presupposition.

Benefits/Detriments: Absolutely brilliant. Not accessible without a background in theology and philosophy.

Muller’s reading of history is that the shift in epistemology was caused by a decline in general of the Aristotelian understanding of substance and accidents, but I am not yet convinced of this conclusion. My sense is that both Platonic and Aristotelian understanding of the “real” allows Christian appropriation, but that the materialistic or Epicurean systems deny this possibility.

Exemplar Quotes:

“The Reformation, in spite of its substantial contribution to the history of doctrine and the shock it delivered to theology and the church in the sixteenth century, was not an attack upon the whole of medieval theology or upon Christian tradition. The Reformation assaulted a limited spectrum of doctrinal and practical abuses with the intention of reaffirming the values of the historical church catholic. Thus, the mainstream Reformers reconstructed the doctrines of justification and the sacraments and then modified their ideas of the ordo salutis and of the church accordingly; but they did not alter the doctrine of God, creation, providence, and Christ, and they maintained the Augustinian tradition concerning predestination, human nature and sin. The reform of individual doctrines, like justification and the sacraments, occurred within the bounds of a traditional, orthodox, and catholic system which, on the grand scale, remained unaltered” (97).

“At the same time, the orthodox writers of the era tended to argue against the Epicurean and Stoic revival. In the trajectory of rationalism also diverges, give both the associate of Epicureanism with the early “deists,” and the strong relationship between much of the later rationalist philosophy with the Stoic and Epicurean revivals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries” (145).

“[Turretin] and the other Protestant scholastics recognize as correct the Aristotelian assumption that the reality is not the idea or universal known to the mind but universal in the thing. The establishment of theologia as an existent thing, moreover, represents the establishment both of true and of false theology—or more precisely, of the existence of the phenomenon claiming to be sapientia rerum divinarum and the possibility of attaining to a true theology, that is, a genuine wisdom of divine things. The presence of this problematic within the argument leads the Protestant scholastics to state their case in a somewhat interactive manner, the prolegomena both laying the ground for the system that follows and drawing upon the theological assumptions and conclusions present in that system. Theological prolegomena cannot be entirely vordogmatisch or predogmatic: they stand in dialogue with the system and in fact, are a system in miniature, stated at the level of presupposition” (161-162).

“[Y]et scholastic theology in the sense of revealed theology quatenus traditur modo scholis familiari (“to the extent that it is taught in the manner of the schools”), and as Alsted defined it, is useful in polemic against the scholasticism of the Roman Church, in debate with Gentiles and atheists, and in convincing rational souls of the truth of revelation” (187).

Archetypal and Ectypal Theology from Polanus’ Syntagma

True theology is either archetypal or ectypal.

Ectypal theology (theologia ectypa) is considered either in itself (in se) or as it is in rational creatures (in creaturis rationalibus).

The ends or goals (fines) of the theology communicated to rational creatures are two: the primary and highest is the glorification of God as the highest good (glorification Dei tanquam summi boni): the secondary and subordinate is the blessedness of rational creatures (beatitude creaturarum rationalium).

The parts of blessedness are two: (1) freedom from all evils and possession of all true goods that rational creatures can posses in God; (2) the vision of God (visio Dei), conformity to God, sufficiency in God and a certain knowledge of his eternal felicity.

The vision of God is either obscure or clear.

Ectypal theology considered as it is in rational creatures is either of Christ as he is head of the Church according to his humanity or of the members of Christ’s body (membrorum Christi).

This latter theology is either of the blessed (beatorum) or of earthly pilgrims (viatorum).

The theology of the blessed (theologia beatorum) is either of angels or of men.

The theology of pilgrims (theologia viatorum) has a two-fold pattern: for it is considered either absolutely (abosolute) or relatively (secundum quid).

The theology of pilgrims absolutely so-called and considered according to its nature, is essentially one, eternal and immutable: considered according to adjuncts it is either old (vetus) or new (nova).

Theology of pilgrims or our theology (theologia viatorum seu nostra) considered relatively or as it exists in individual pilgrims through the activity of efficient causes is partly infused (infusa) and partly acquired (acquisita). Polanus, Syntagma, Synopsis Libri I. (Muller, 226).

“The attempt to draw faith and philosophy together, whether in the more Aristotelian model of Albert and Thomas on in the more Augustinian approach of Bonaventure, had not resulted in any easy alliance of faith and reason, but in fact had yielded various cautionary approaches that recognized the diastasis between revelation and the truths known to reason. This diastasis, moreover, reflected the sense that God so radically transcended the grasp of human faculties that no easy analogy could be made between the divine and human” (227).

“If, on the other hand, Aristotelianism is defined as a view of the universe that affirms both primary and a secondary causality, that assumes the working of first and final causality through the means of instrumental, formal, and material causes, and that, using this paradigm, can explain various levels of necessary and contingent existence, then a large number of Aristotelians appear on the horizons. . . applied loosely, the term will define the thought of numerous thinkers, all of whom denied or radically modified tenets central to Aristotle’s own thought”  (372).

“The demise of the model [R. scholastic] can certainly be chronicled in the in the loss of the hylomorphic understanding of substance and in its corollary concern the relationship between the logical realm and the realm of real being” (380).

“Once it has been recognized that philosophy, like natural theology, has a legitimate though not doctrinally formative or fundamental use in the context of Christian faith, the actual function of reason and philosophy within the system of revealed theology can be outlined. Theological criteria must be understood as functioning as the criteria by which philosophical conclusions are assessed while, at the same time, the rational argumentation of philosophy must serve to prevent errors of logic or pure irrationality from entering the Christian theological system. Reason, therefore is understood as a critical instrument, limited in its use and always subordinate to the divinely given truths of Scripture—a tool that does assist in the drawing of conclusions and in the formulation and defense of Christian doctrine but that does not supply the ultimate content or the final criterion of truth in Christian doctrine. The proper use of philosophy in the service of theology is to remove confusion and present valid arguments against heresies” (398).

“Reason, then, does not introduce into the text of Scripture a meaning that is not present there, but rather serves faith by drawing out legitimate conclusions from the text, by making explicit those truths which are presented implicitly” (401).

“Reason, therefore, cannot be the cognitive foundation of theology inasmuch as it cannot know God in and of himself and inasmuch as it is not a divine self-revelation but only an instrument for understanding revelation. Since, moreover, the archetype infinitely transcends nature and since the ultimate end of theology is of grace and not nature, the natural order and its revelation cannot be the cognitive foundation of Christian theology. What remains is the divine self-revelation in and through the word as recorded in the biblical witness. Thus, the Word of God written is the principium cognoscendi theologiae.” (434).