Ronald Horton, Mood Tides: Divine Purpose in the Rhythms of Life

Greenville, Journey Forth: 2008, 194 pgs.

Summary: A brief, eloquent meditation on God’s use of the emotions within the human heart for sanctification, maturation, and edification. The book is gentle, wise and balanced. It takes its place in Christian literature somewhere between Lewis’ A Grief Observed and Boethius’ The Consolation of Philosophy.

In his pursuit of balance Dr. Horton creates a unique theological framework which embraces an Augustinian view of human love as ordered loves or eudemonic love (70-74), while shying away from Augustine’s view of human freedom (44) by drawing the veil of mystery over it. At the same time, Horton's view of God’s love toward humanity is most similar to Arminius’ construction—God’s love toward humanity can be thwarted (77) while God remains sovereign.

He very carefully and biblically corrects reactionary responses among conservative Christians to Freud, the self-esteem movement, secular psychology, and psychiatric medicine. Further, he provides edifying guidance on how to cope with high and low emotions and experiences.

Exemplar Quotes:

On Paradoxes: Paradoxes, that is, can be mere verbal mechanisms, such as that of the two gates, or they can be of the actual substance of the idea, such as that grain of wheat. The latter further divide into the easily resolvable or the ultimately unresolvable. The unresolvable include some of the most important truths we have (26).

The Offered Life: And if the life we have to offer is a wretched confusion, shattered by blows from the world and reduced to a sin-stricken rubble? Then we make from the fragments of that life an altar on which to offer what is left of our poor selves. “An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me,” said the Lord to His people, adding “in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee” (Exod. 20:24). We ourselves, formed of the dust of the ground, can be that altar of earth as well as the sacrifice placed upon it (107).

On Depression: The virtues of patience and trust may need to be stressed to the ill or injured. Heeding medical instruction is an obedience issue. Keeping up the spiritual life and resting in the promises of God are always important reminders (150).

Reassurance: [God] has warm thoughts for the struggling, defeated Christian and is ready with assurance of His love and strength. To refuse to forgive ourselves for that for which we have been forgiven is understandable when the failure is from a human view egregious and irreversible, but to continue in self-rejection is ultimately an act of spiritual nullification: an unwillingness to receive with thanks the kindness of our Redeemer (169).

Benefits/Detriments: Worship is the practical outcome of the science of theology. Dr. Horton’s practical advice touching on how we love God and love each other is deep, warm, and edifying because he is teaching us to love God with all our being and our neighbor as ourselves.

The only weakness of the book from my perspective is that in attempting to balance the antinomy between God’s sovereignty and man’s free will Dr. Horton ends up describing God’s love as being ultimately thwarted by man’s action. Such a step appears to make God’s satisfaction contingent on human action either through God’s foreknowledge expressed in egalitarian love and the creation order or some other means.

As long as the reader makes no attempt to systematize Horton’s anthropological and theological views of love, Mood Tides will be of great benefit to all that read it.

David O. Beale, In Pursuit of Purity: American Fundamentalism since 1850

Unusual Publications, Greenville: 1986, 457 pgs.

Summary: A clear, well-researched and documented history of Fundamentalism from the perspective of a scholarly separatist at Bob Jones University. The basic argument is that nonconformist Fundamentalism (1857-1920) progressed into separatist Fundamentalism (1920s to present) as the true Fundamentalists discovered that “a full-orbed holiness includes both personal and ecclesiastical aspects” (6). Thus the best Christians are separatists and the suspect Christians are New Evangelicals, Neo-fundamentalist, and Broad Evangelicals. There is a tentative admittance in a footnote that godliness exists among a category of conservative Christians that are neither Fundamentalist nor New Evangelicals (270) but who strictly maintain a confessional position through a doctrinal statement and denominational associations.

In Pursuit of Purity has the only academic introduction to the Free Presbyterians of Northern Ireland of which I am aware and contains a large amount original research from primary sources on the development of Dispensationalism in the United States and its relationship to separatist Fundamentalism. There is also a chapter on the Canadian Baptist Shields’ attempt to turn Des Moines University into a Fundamentalist Bible College and the resulting riot.

A fascinating subtext exists within the footnotes as Beale corrects older and less scholarly historians within the Fundamentalist movement. For instance, George W. Dollar’s A History of Fundamentalism is corrected as is Brenda M. Meehan in Foundations.

The tone is much more irenic then the above summary sounds, in part because Dr. Beale is such a careful historian and is earnestly attempting to serve Jesus Christ. Some of Dr. Beale’s interpretations and applications of history may be imbalanced, but the careful scholarship is exemplarily.

Benefits and Detriments: There is an almost habitual assumption of in-house definitions: holiness is separation (6-7) and biblical theology is Dispensationalism (33).  Both statements may be defensible, but they cannot be assumed in an academic setting.

The Baptist Frank Norris and Presbyterian Carl McIntire receive much gentler treatment than they deserve; Norris more so that McIntire. Both men’s behavior was a public embarrassment to Christ, but both maintained Fundamentalist boundary markers.  The words, “Norris introduced a silver-plated weapon, which he claimed Chipps had been carrying at the time of the shooting,” during his trial “for the murder of an unarmed man” (234) describe too grotesque a situation to not require some sort of biblical condemnation.

The Norris-McIntire issue illustrates the central weakness of the book; there is no critique or record of Fundamentalists declining into reactionary and rigorist heresies or confusion. Peter Ruckman and Jack Hyles are not mentioned, though Hyles played a key role in Fundamentalist history.  Evangelical propensities toward sin are exposed but Fundamentalist’s propensities towards heterodoxy and sin are gilded over.

Extremely helpful introduction to separatist Fundamentalism in the modern era. Evangelical pastors should read it to recognize the sinful potential within their doctrine and practice. A bit academic for lay readers, but should be required reading for Baptist pastors and modern church historians.

D. A. Carson, How Long, O Lord? Reflections on Suffering and Evil

Baker Academics, 2006, 240 pgs.

Summary: Suffering will come. For most of us grotesque and horrifying events will unfold in excruciating slowness or with the suddenness of a lightning strike. The suffering that enters our life will have a palatable weight in our hearts. It will feel as if the very ground has opened its mouth to hell; we are not yet immersed in the fire, but blasts of trauma will belch forth from the pit, and we will be shaken.

Having written so dramatically, allow me an anti-climatic suggestion. Prepare for future suffering, process past trauma, and be ready to counsel others by having a robustly biblical understanding of suffering and the problem of evil. The first step in preparation and processing is relentlessly striving to not be conformed to this world but to have your mind transformed by Scripture and the Spirit. The next step is likely to read How Long, O Lord?

The book is a clear, biblically and academically informed mediation on the problem of evil and suffering in this world. Concise, godly and covering the main philosophical and theological objections against compatibilism (God is exhaustively sovereign and man is responsible for his sin) at a thoughtful layman’s reading level.

Benefits and Detriments: The only weakness that I can find is that Carson sometimes chides at traditional theological vocabulary and distinctions—for instance in the case of the immutability and atemporality of God. He remains orthodox, but there’s a sense of irritation. My suspicion is that he sees this as being more biblical, but this requires that we then argue that Anslem, Calvin, Turretin, Shedd, Augustine, Thomas, and so forth are less biblical than Carson, and this makes me nervous. On the issue of God and time, see Augustine’s Confessions and Paul Helm’s Eternal God, and on immutability see Shedd’s Dogmatics or Calvin’s Institutes.

How Long, O Lord? is an incredibly important book for all thoughtful Christians. Please read it before the suffering comes.

J. Gresham Machen, Christianity and Liberalism

Wm. B. Eerdmans Publising Company, 1923, 189 pgs.

Summary: Dr. Machen’s (1881-1937) trenchant review of Christian liberalism and a defense of historical orthodoxy written in 1923. Machen was born and buried in Baltimore. His grave is at Greenmount Cemetery.

Liberalism as a theological construct is an attempt to split the difference between the religion revealed in the Bible and modern Epicurean or materialistic interpretations of nature. Machen taught that liberalism was simply not “the faith once handed down to the saints.”

“The liberal preacher is really rejecting the whole basis of Christianity, which is a religion founded not on aspirations, but on facts. Here is found the most fundamental difference between liberalism and Christianity—liberalism is altogether in the imperative mood, while Christianity begins with a triumphant indicative; liberalism appeals to man’s will, while Christianity announces, first, a gracious act of God” (47).

Benefits/Detriments: Evangelicalism cycles through spasms of attempting to compromise with the reigning intellectual systems. Until the prevalent non-Christian worldview stops being materialistic, Christianity and Liberalism will need to be read and re-read by the succeeding generations. Machen’s work also addresses many of the basic issues within theological relativism.

Recommend for all, but especially for pastors and college students.

Albert Mohler, The Conviction to Lead: 25 Principles for Leadership that Matters

Bethany House Publishers, 2012, pgs. 220

Allow me to give a thumbnail sketch of an historical event, and then I’ll pull in some dates and names, and spin the whole thing about to a review of Dr. Mohler’s The Conviction to Lead.

There once was a reasonably sophisticated politician with some decidedly mediocre theology. He was a decent man who gave popular speeches that moved the masses. He recognized that the political and cultural elite were leading the people away from the wholesome traditions of the past. He began to poke about and discovered part of the intellectual source of the decline. It was a combination of English Epicureanism and a German philosopher. And so in all earnestness he began the public battle.

He bloodied his enemies enough through citation and critique that they took notice of him. Two in particular plotted against him—a lawyer and newspaperman. The lawyer had defended two rich wastrels who had read the German philosopher and murdered a youth in response. The newspaperman had written extensively on English Epicureanism and translated the German philosopher as well as wrote the first American introduction to his canon.

The politician being a decent man with weak theology didn’t see the trap. He could sway live audiences but he didn’t understand the power of the popular media nor was he capable of lying and spinning in the papers like his enemies. And so he won a legal case but lost the national battle, and then he died.

William Jennings Byran died believing that he won the Scopes’ Trial. He hoped this victory would be the culmination of his long public battle against Nietzsche’s philosophy and Darwin’s scientific materialism. But he hoped in vain. Clarence Darrow (cf. his defense of Leopold and Loeb) and H. L. Mencken (translator of the Antichrist and author of The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche) understood that they had won the battle of public opinion.

The Scopes’ Monkey Trial was the greatest public setback of orthodox Christianity that I am aware of in modern history. Bryan was a convictional leader, but he violated or ignored about half of the twenty-five principles Dr. Mohler lays out in his book The Conviction to Lead. He shared the convictions but lacked the wisdom. The issue is not that Mohler’s insights are new, but rather Bryan was hamstrung by a theological system and heritage that underestimated the human propensity towards untruth.  Also, Bryan had grown soft, lazy, and pompous on the paid speakers’ circuit. The basic theological, moral, and practical weaknesses of Bryan remain within popular evangelicalism.

Mohler’s book and life lacks these weaknesses. His convictions were forged after Bryan’s failure by the likes of Karl F. H. Henry, and Molher understands the times. The backbone of his theology is thoroughly Augustinian. The Bishop of Hippo does not appear in the citations, but he organizes Mohler’s assessment of both man and God (cf. 70-72). Further, a robust Augustinianism informs the practice and posture of self-critique and humility which blossom within principles like “The Moral Virtues of Leadership.”

The book is packaged to take its place next to T. D. Jakes’ works, but the discerning reader should place the book nearer at least in intent to Alexis de Tocqueville’s invitation to the French nobility in Democracy in America. De Tocqueville was offering a model of conservative reform in the aftermath of the Revolution; Mohler does much the same.

Mohler has drawn from everyone from Stephen King to Martin Luther to distil his thoughts for effective and godly leadership. Stodgy academics and sanctimonious ideologues may be befuddled and tempted to ignore a book that quotes Bill Murray movies and Justin Martyr. Such would be a mistake. A writer who both has and mocks his memento mori needs to be taken with a degree of academic gravitas (200); and anyone who observes Mohler’s handling and use of Scripture should consider carefully his handling and use of pop culture.

And so friends and enemies of Mohler’s convictions, here is the blueprint.  What shall you do with it?

Carl R. Trueman, Reformation: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

Christian Focus Publications, 2011, 127 pgs.

Summary: Four chapters originally delivered as lectures by Professor Trueman at the Evangelical Theological College of Wales in 2000. He lays out the importance of Luther’s theological insight at the Reformation and its relevance for today. Trueman is a professor at Westminster Theological Seminary.

Trueman argues that Luther brought Jesus Christ back into the center of theological discussion by recognizing that Roman Catholic theology was “cheapening God’s grace, trivializing sin and misleading the laity” (20). Further, “[c]orrupt belief and corrupt practice went hand-in-hand, and one could not be reformed without the reformation of the other” (21).

The lesson that the modern church must recognize is that the flesh is constantly attempting to drag good and even wicked things into the center of our doctrine and practice. The process of “cheapening God’s grace” and “trivializing sin” is a constant battle and not merely a onetime event. To overcome the pull of bad doctrine and practice, we must return to Paul, and Luther’s, theology of the cross that places Christ in the center.

God in Christ only remains in the center of church life and doctrine when the word is preached, and the Bible studied and understood by the entire congregation.

Benefits/Detriments: Excellent and helpful book. Establishes a solid framework for considering the Reformation and church life.

Recommended for all.  On the bookstall.

Kevin Schut, Of Games and God: A Christian Exploration of Video Games

Brazo Press, 2013.

Summary: A consideration of video games within a loose framework of the Reformed understanding of general grace and creation modified by a post-modern strain of epistemological humility/coolness/antinomianism.

The book is likely best summarized by Schut’s: “So, taking all the stuff we’ve just discussed, here’s what I think” (67). “But to my way of thinking. . .” (122). “I get the feeling from some Christian reviews and essays that there can only be one right way for a follower of Christ to think about an issue. I’m not at all convinced this is the case when we talk about something like, say, gender in video games. In any case, even if there is a right and wrong interpretation of a video game, I believe strongly in the notion of grace—if we get something wrong, it is covered” (176).

In other words, Dr. Schut’s understanding of theology allows him to play games along these lines: “The chain-mail bikini is very revealing. In Fantasy RPG artwork, a shapely woman warrior stereotypically wears her armor like a beer commercial model. She either leaves her glorious torso exposed to slashing swords of enemies. . .(see the unavoidable image on p. 94)—or wears a skintight, suffocating suit of armor. . . (93)

[Under the image] “The princess Amelie, sporting a variation on the chain-mail bikini. A better title for this game would probably be King’s Bounty: Poorly Armored Princess. To be fair, this really is a fun game, even if the skin shown (mostly in this game-opening image) is totally gratuitous” (94)

The book contains some fairly high level philosophical analysis: Video games are media. As a medium video games have attributes similar to other medium—narrative, use of symbols for communication, rules. But video games also allow the possibility of creating an interactive experience that includes immersion in the activity and play. Video games as media are neither good nor evil, but like “all media is broken” (43).The content of the games is also neither good nor evil because “[v]ideo games are a site where we create meaning” (26).

And this leads to statements like “for one person, the knife evokes the fear of an attack, and for the next, the joy of cooking. So does the image of the knife suggest violence or tastiness? Video-game worlds are phenomenally complex, requiring a lot of interpretation” (58-59)

And the conclusion: “What I believe is that for Christians, all things are permissible, but not all things are beneficial. What this means in practice is constant self-monitoring, conversation , and engagement. Do bloodthirsty games encourage me to be bloodthirsty? Am I less sympathetic to the oppressed after playing video games? Am I buying into attitudes and ideologies that I should not, attitudes that glorify destructive acts, inflicting pain, and causing death” (71)?

There are also simply confusing statements: “I can guarantee that humanity became something different after the invention of the chair” (80). And, “I keep waiting for a video game, for instance, that explores the theological concept of grace—a kind of experimental anticompetive game” (48). It’s not readily apparent how “humanity became something different” with or without chairs or how the unmerited favor of God (i.e. grace) could be experimental and anticompetive.

Detriments/Benefits: Dr. Schut has given us an academically informed discussion on video games and expressed his opinion from a generally Christian worldview.

His bibliography is helpful and his discussion of education and the dangers of fanboyism are edifying.

The difficulty is that he has not made a serious attempt to think through what God’s opinion is of imagined violence, sensuality, erotic images, or even the differences between rest and play or entertainment and thought experiments.

There is overlap between Schut’s Christian intuitions and Scripture, but he seems to be more reflexive than biblically grounded. God makes clear statements against imagined violence (Prov. 3:31, 16:27; Ps. 11:5), imagined eroticism (Matt. 5:28), and enjoying wickedness (Ps. 34:6) as sin, but a reader will have to turn elsewhere to attempt to discern if they are pleasing God by playing Red Dead Redemption or Grand Theft Auto for the purpose of entertainment. Schut’s only moral concern seems to be that playing with “chainmail bikini” clad babes leads to adultery and not that it leads to lust.

Schut carefully and correctly argues that video games cannot be evil in themselves. This is firmly supported by Scripture (Rom. 14:14). And he points out that it is possible to imagine scenarios whereby a Christian can interact with the content of say Grand Theft Auto without necessarily sinning and supports this with 1 Corinthians 6:12. But because Schut makes no distinction between entertainment and thought experiments, there is no defense of pretending to pillage, murder, for the fun of it. The way of the wicked is described as joining those “who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil” (Prov. 2:14). If we rejoice in imagining sin, we are sinning.

Besides the biblical element, there are two more components. The first is that the meaning of the symbols is decided by the user of the game, instead of an interaction between the game designers and the player. Communication is when one person communicates ideas to another person. The game designers of Wi Fit and King’s Bounty are purposely creating different communicative events. For instance Wi Fit purposely limits the eroticism in the avatars.  The designers of the King’s Bounty expect players to enjoy the eroticism of the symbols, but for a Christian to “look with lustful intent” (Matt. 5:28) is sin. In other words to experience the King’s Bounty as intended by the designers is sin.

We find something similar in his argument about a knife above. Everyone readily admits that a knife can be used for good and evil. But how does the “symbol of knife” being used to stab zombies or slash prostitutes communicate “tastiness?” The meaning of a symbol is created by a context; for an event of communication to occur between the designers and the player there must be an agreement as to the meaning of knife within the rules of the video game. A player who attempts to play Red Dead Redemption by a personal symbol code of say Gatling guns functioning as ice-cream scoops and pistols as watermelons is not playing the game and has not communicated with the designers.

Schut has confused the fact that in a communication event within a medium there can be different moral intents and uses with communication itself. Jesus illustrates this for us clearly in (Matt. 22): the intent of Caesar stamping a coin with a blasphemous inscription on both sides and his own image was idolatry. Jesus’ permission to use such a coin did not suggest that he was giving a different meaning to the words or symbols that Caesar was using. Idolatry remains a sin, but one can use the coin without participating in the message as long as they don’t use it in the way intended by the creator. Schut teaches that using Grand Theft Auto as a sermon illustration and using it to pretend to steal cars and to lust is the same moral action, but this is not the teaching of Jesus.

The second issue is Schut’s understanding that media is broken. This functions as an undefended presupposition inside his system and allows if not requires moral compromise by Christians to engage with media. Christians cannot expect wholesome and good things from any medium because the media must carry perversity. But the Bible teaches that the broken thing is not our technology or communication mediums, but the human heart (Mark 7:18-23).

The human heart that rejoices over pretending to rip out a symbolic spinal column of a symbol of a man created in the image of God is sinning. The human heart that enjoys slashing symbols communicating prostitute with a symbol communicating chainsaw is sinning. Lusting after an erotic symbol of a woman who is not your wife according to Jesus is the same as committing adultery with her.

Jonathan Leeman, Church Membership: How the World Knows Who Represents Christ

Crossway, 2012, 142 pgs.

Summary: Leeman makes the biblical argument that local congregations are embassies and gathering spots of the kingdom of heaven (Eph. 2:19; 6:18-20; 2 Cor. 5:20; Phil. 3:20). Thus, for the Christian church membership is not a voluntary association, because we are commanded to be a part of the local church by our Lord.

As representatives of the Lord Jesus Christ, the church has the responsibility to identify Christians and assist them in obeying the laws of the kingdom. The order of the church, who is recognized as a representative of Christ, and how Christians submit to the church are all carefully defined and explained from the Bible.

Exemplar Quotes:

Just as the Bible establishes the government of your nation as your highest authority on earth when it comes to your citizenship in that nation, so the Bible establishes the local church as your highest authority on earth when it comes to your discipleship to Christ and your citizenship in Christ’s present and promised nation (25).

When you open your Bible, stop looking for signs of a club with its voluntary members. Look instead for a Lord and his bound-together people. Look also for other forms of unity (brothers and sisters in a family, branches on a vine, etc.) (26).

Benefits/Detriments: Helpful, thoughtful, sometimes amusing, but always biblical. Highly recommended for all.

The Quest of the Holy Grail, P. M. Matarasso, trans.

Penguin Books, 2005, 304 pgs.

Summary: An extended Christian critique of the secular forms of the code chivalry through a popular fable written in about 1200 AD.  The knights of King Arthur’s Round Table are joined by Lancelot’s illegitimate son Galahad and set out on the quest for the holy grail. The story follows Lancelot’s discovery that he is not a true knight of Jesus Christ but rather a servant of the devil because of his mortal sin with Guinevere. It chronicles his conviction, repentance, and restoration to the faith.

The three knights who discover the grail are Galahad, Perceval, and Bors. Galahad serves as the holy foil to Lancelot in the quest. All the strange adventures and visions of the knights are interpreted by monks, priests, and an angel. The adventure is a spiritual journey, so the fisticuffs and jousts are minimal.

Perhaps the most edifying quote in the books occurs in an exchange between Galahad and Lancelot:

Lancelot said, ‘Son, since it is for ever that I leave you, do you beseech the Master in my name not to let me quit His service, but so to keep me close that I may be His servant in this life and the next.’ And Galahad answered him: ‘Sir, there is no prayer so efficacious as your own. Be therefore mindful of yourself’ (259).

The book also contains one of the most helpful footnotes I’ve read:

In a general way the adventure represents the random, the gratuitous, the unpredictable elements in life; often it is a challenge which causes a man to measure himself against standards more than human, to gamble life for honour or both for love. To this the author of the Quest adds a further dimension. For him the adventure is above all God working and manifesting Himself in the physical world. To accept an adventure is to accept an encounter with a force which is in the proper sense of the word supernatural, an encounter which is always perilous for the sinner or the man of little faith and much presumption. To the faithful it implies submission to God’s providence (293-294).

Benefits/Detriments: The theology of the Quest is an interesting mix of late medieval theology. There is a manly respect for the sovereignty of God and human responsibility in salvation and daily life, regardless of the comments of the translator (cf. fn. 20). The cult of Mary is mentioned but is not at the center of the spirituality of the tale. Transubstantiation is assumed and illustrated by miraculous visions. Marriage is not presented as the Christian ideal, but virginity and constancy are heavily extolled. The temptation scenes and discussion of virginity are not erotic, but they are likely best left to more mature audiences. The footnotes should be perused with theological care but are generally very helpful.

The Quest is obviously the source of much of Tolkien and C. S. Lewis’ symbolism. Recommended for mature high school students and avid readers of Christian literature.  Should be read by all thoughtful Christian young men who hope for adventure.

G. K. Chesterton, Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox

Sam Torode Books Arts, reprint, n.d.; 1933, 110 pgs.

Summary: A brief biography of Thomas Aquinas and overview of his philosophy, written by a Roman Catholic apologist and critic of modernity G. K. Chesterton (1874-1936).

In Chesterton’s view there are two enemies facing his readers: modernism and the “old Augustinian Puritanism” (1). Augustinianism as understood and taught by Luther “in a very real sense made the modern world” (109). Thus modernism and Augustinianism are collapsed into a single problem including the Manicheans (106), Buddhists, and Nihilists.  Both modernism and Protestantism/Plato can only be cured by returning to the common sense position of Thomas who baptized Aristotle. The problem with Augustine is that he essentially creates two realities: the one that can be seen and the one that is thought or believed. Thomas’ common sense grounds epistemology in the five senses and the intrinsic goodness of God’s creation including the goodness of the human intellect, will, and affections and then works towards God through logic thus unifying reality. Creation used correctly leads to salvation, because there is no absolute division between God and man. The only thing that keeps people from submitting to Thomas’ arguments is a lack of time to consider the arguments carefully. Religion is then necessitated by the lack of leisure for most people and the ignorance of the masses.

Benefits/Detriments: Chesterton paints with a very broad brush in a witty, paradoxical, and interesting way; what he writes that is true is very true; what he writes that is untrue is very much a lie. Chesterton’s review of Thomas’ early life and Thomas’ understanding of being is helpful, as is much of the critique of modernism. As far as I am able to tell from having read Thomas, Chesterton has almost exhaustively misunderstood the modifications that Thomas made to Aristotle and his use of Scripture, Augustine, and the philosophers. We can add to this Chesterton’s belief that Dante was Thomistic rather than a follower of the heretical Muslim Averroes (82).  And his criticism of Luther seems to be based on an overemphasis on Luther’s most hyperbolic rhetoric rather than his actual theology and practice.

Folded within Chesterton’s reading of Thomas is the claimed presupposition of the magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church. Yet he goes beyond Thomas on underestimating the noetic affects of the Fall and perhaps has even tacitly rejected the historical doctrine of original sin. Further, common sense cannot teach transubstantiation, the levitation of ox-like theologians, and floating animated crucifixes (72). The inclusion of this material completely undermines the epistemological argument of Chesterton, because he has recreated the dualistic world that he claims Thomas unifies by common sense.

If Chesterton is half the thinker he appears to be, he’s not defending Thomas, the Catholic Church, or any form of orthodox belief, but he is giving a very robust and popular defense of his understanding of a modified Aristotle and offering the Roman Church as a resting place for “rational” moderns. If this reading is correct, it allows a rather more Aristotelian then Christian interpretation of the last lines of the last chapter directly speaking of Thomas:

This is, in a very rude outline, his philosophy; it is impossible in such an outline to describe his theology. Anyone writing so small a book about so big a man, must leave out something. Those who know him best will best understand why, after some considerable consideration, I have left out the only important thing (99).

The most terrible issue is that much of Chesterton’s understanding of the baptizing of Aristotle and even of Thomas’ work breaks with the inspired teaching of Paul in 1 Corinthians 1-3. And I have a sudden insight that Lewis wasn’t joking when he wrote that in hell the bookshops were “of the sort that sell The Works of Aristotle” (The Great Divorce, first paragraph).