Gordon Clark: Christianity Diluted (The Southern Presbyterian Journal)

1957. Christianity Diluted. The Southern Presbyterian Journal. XV (39), Jan 23. pg. 4.

Christianity Diluted

An excellent way of weakening the force of Christianity is to attach the name to ideas and practices which slightly resemble but considerably distort the real thing. In the Medieval period the mendacious monks, the superstitious mass, the veneration of relics, and the sale of indulgences virtually extinguished Christianity because they were called Christianity.

Today the stress on the universal brotherhood of man, the socialistic reconstruction of society, along with bingo and fish-fries, obscure the teaching of the Bible. And on a more academic level the merging of secular philosophies with a few Scriptural terms accomplishes the same thing.

For example, Professor Richard Kroner, lately of Union Seminary, N. Y., now of Temple University, has just published the first of three volumes in which he hopes to explain the entire history of philosophy on the basis of an antithesis between human speculation and divine revelation. As one might expect there are many statements in the book, Speculation in Pre-Christian Philosophy, to which no exception can be taken. In particular, he has written a very fine chapter on Aristotle. But along the way he has also made some assertions that give us pause.

There seems to be, at least in my opinion, no good reason for saying that Thales, the first Greek philosopher, practiced a form of speculation or enjoyed an insight that is the "analogue to the revealed truth on which Christian thinkers later relied." Nor can I believe that Heraclitus, who held that the universe develops out of an original fire, should be said to have "a strong affinity with Biblical revelation." Nor can Parmenides be justly pictured as "paving the way for the Christian age."

Of course, the pantheism of these thinkers helped to undermine the polytheism of the popular Greek religion, and in this sense they might be said to prepare the way for the Gospel. But to suppose that their theories had any affinity with Biblical theology is to press beyond the truth.

Subordinate only to the conception of God transcendent, the Biblical conception of man sharply differentiates Greek paganism from Christianity. In some respects Kroner notices this. He acknowledges that the Greek thinkers were autonomous, that they recognized no other authority than empirical observation and the demands of their own minds. This acknowledgment is commendable and important. Nonetheless, although he had an excellent opportunity to point out another and even more obvious difference, Kroner neglects to mention the Christian teaching of man as a sinner.

On page 140 Kroner says, "Socrates discovered a new dimension of the human soul . . . the dimension of the Biblical conceptions of man and God." Now, in the first place, Socrates had the haziest conception of God; it is uncertain that he even believed in a life after death. In the second place, his idea of man is alien to the Biblical picture.

Granted that he was sincere and conscientious to a greater degree than his contemporaries, still it does not follow that "Socrates discovered the dimension of the moral conscience, a dimension unknown to the Greeks." Still less does it follow that his morality was Christian. His attendance at drinking bouts (even if he stayed sober) and his tolerance of pederasty contrast with Christian views. And underlying this is the absence of the concept of sin. This is not to say that he did not in some fashion distinguish between right and wrong; but most emphatically it means that he shows no consciousness of the need of a Saviour.

One should not condemn a man, even a minister in the pulpit, for noting superficial similarities between Christian principles and pagan culture. But when there is a persistent attempt to present these similarities as profound, Christianity is ipso facto diluted. Rather it is to be desired that the Gospel should be stated with accuracy, clarity, and definiteness. Superficial impressionism tends toward mystical vacuity. Precision, exactitude, and the fullness the situation permits are not supererogatory ideals in proclaiming salvation.

— G.H.C.