Gordon H. Clark
Professor, Covenant College
Lookout Mountain, Tennessee
(RPCES)
Since no one claims that the Westminster Confession is
inerrant, it is theoretically subject to improvement. But assuming that the aim
of reformulation includes the preservation of all the thought unchanged, and is
not a disguise for lowering the standards, one must still ask two questions: Is
the present generation capable of improving the creed? And, if so, is it worth
the energy?
One answer to the second question would be a government
grant so that a hundred theologians could meet for five years in a national
cathedral. Or are we now so adept that a committee of three could do the job in
one summer?
It would not be an easy job. Who would play the role of
George Gillespie? Or Moderator Twisse? And Samuel Rutherford? The theological
ability of such men was enormous; Dr. J. Gresham Machen asserted that it could
not be duplicated today.
In addition to their knowledge of theology, their command of
the English language is hardly equaled in the age when Johnny can’t read.
Examples of words and phraseology, the precision of which contemporary
theologians might be hard pressed to duplicate, are the verbs ‘impute’ and ‘convey’
and the phrase ‘any spiritual good accompanying salvation.’
What seems more necessary is a tightening of the ordination
vows that now permit an all too vague subscription to the ‘system of doctrine’
rather than to each of the doctrines severally.
Finally, the single thing I would change would be to add the
word ‘inerrant.’
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