The Clark Debate, The Calvin Forum, and the Intellect of Man

I recently read a few references to Gordon Clark in The Calvin Forum, a periodical which ran from 1935-1956. One such instance is the following which was written by Richard W. Gray, a member of five-person committee that was commissioned by the twelfth general assembly "TO CONSIDER THE DOCTRINAL PORTION OF THE COMPLAINT OF CERTAIN MEMBERS OF THE PRESBYTERY OF PHILADELPHIA." Gray writes: 

A caucus of leaders had met prior to the First General Assembly. Those leaders included Dr. Machen and certain men involved in the present controversy. These men were zealous for a pure Calvinistic church as is manifest by the series of articles to which Mr. Heerema referred, "The Reformed Faith and Modern Substitutes." This caucus picked Dr. Gordon H. Clark to nominate Dr. Machen. At that time his differences with Dr. Cornelius Van Til were well known, as those who were students at Westminster Seminary at that time can testify. Prior to that time his article, "Determinism and Responsibility," which is the basis for one of the four parts of the Complaint lodged against him, had been printed in The Evangelical Quarterly (January, 1932). That those views which were then looked upon as differences within the orbit of the Reformed Faith should today be Complained against as opposed to "some of the most central doctrines of the Christian faith" is, I repeat, strange.

If that can be explained on the basis of the impossibility of bringing to light the views of all the men in the place of leadership in the early days, here are some more recent facts which the average observer of the controversy in the OPC finds difficult to reconcile. 

In May of 1941, Dr. Clark at the invitation of the faculty of Westminster Seminary delivered the Commencement Address. Anyone who knows the care with which the Reformed testimony of that institution is jealously guarded is confused by the fact that less than three years later some of his views are challenged because it is alleged they vitiate some of the central doctrines of the Christian faith. 

Finally, in November, 1943, less than a year before the views of Dr. Clark were challenged, his article, "On the Primacy of the Intellect," appeared in the Westminster Theological Journal, a periodical edited for the faculty of Westminster Seminary. Strange indeed did it sound to hear Dr. Van Til charge on the floor of the General Assembly that this article of Dr. Clark's assumed a Greek rather than a Christian view of the position of man's intellect. This article, which formed part of the basis for another fourth of the Complaint, appeared in a journal dedicated to the purpose of promoting the interests of the Reformed Faith and edited on behalf of several of the Complainants. 

For these paradoxes I am offering no solution. I am simply stating that they are part of the historical record which is the background of the present controversy. And I think it is safe to add that they have contributed to the perplexity of the situation in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church.  

I had never heard that differences between Van Til and Clark were well-known as early as 1936. That would indeed beg the question as to why Clark was invited to speak at WTS commencements and write in the WTJ. Given the similarity in origin of WTS and the OPC, it would be hard to understand an argument that the first 15 years of WTS had a lower bar for Reformed input than those standards by which prospective OPC ministers were measured.

I was also unaware that a caucus of men voted for Clark to nominate Machen as the first OPC GA moderator. From the records of The Presbyterian Guardian, it appears John Murray was one of the men in said caucus, as it is he who authored numerous articles by the title of "The Reformed Faith and Modern Substitutes" (and, as Gray says, was also a complainant). This is interesting in that John Muether writes that Arthur Kuschke told him the 1940s ordeal is "better described as the Clark-Murray debate" as opposed to Clark-Van Til (Cornelius Van Til: Reformed Apologist and Churchman, pg. 107).

The statement by Gray is from just one from a series of exchanges between he and Edward Heerema in The Calvin Forum during 1946-1947. The back-and-forth covers several topics, one of which is (in contemporary times) a relatively undiscussed portion of The Complaint:

Dr. Clark does not deny the necessity or the fact of regeneration but he makes no absolute qualitative distinction between the knowledge of the unregenerate man and the knowledge of the regenerate man. With the same ease, the same “common sense”, the unregenerate and the regenerate man can understand propositions revealed to man (p. 20; 28:13-16; 31:13-17; 34:13-35:2).

The clear implication is that the complainants believed that unregenerates cannot "understand propositions revealed to man." Here is Clark's own response to this charge in The Answer:

If the complainants had quoted these passages from the transcript instead of merely referring to them, everyone could have seen that all but the last have nothing to do with the matter of regeneration, and that the last is contradictory to their assertion. The discussion had entered on the proposition “two times two equals four.” Dr. Clark had asserted that any man who knows this proposition knows it by means of the definitions of the numbers and by the laws of logic. Then the transcript continues: “Q. Where do we get those laws of logic? A. ‘Every man that cometh into the world.’ (Obviously the transcript omits part of the quotation.) Q. Is it possible that by the effective sin, man will not be able to deduce by the propositions concerning God? A. That is often the case.” In other words, the complainants imply that Dr. Clark holds that regeneration does not renew the mind or that sin has not affected it; whereas Dr. Clark said specifically that sin often causes men to commit logical fallacies. Thus the complainants cite evidence that is not only irrelevant, but also evidence that contradicts their charge. Some further study of the knowledge of a regenerate man and of an unregenerate man might prove profitable, but the subject can be accorded only the briefest mention. Both the regenerate and the unregenerate can with the same ease understand the proposition, Christ died for sinners. Regeneration, in spite of the theory of the Complaint, is not a change in the understanding of these words. The difference between the regenerate and the unregenerate lies in the fact that the former believes the proposition and the latter does not. The regenerate acknowledges Christ as Lord; the other does not. The one is a willing subject; the other is a rebel. Regeneration is not necessarily a change in understanding propositions. An unregenerate man may understand the proposition “Christ died for sinners,” but far from knowing it to be true, he thinks it to be false. Strictly speaking he knows only that “the Scriptures teach Christ died for sinners.” When he is regenerated, his understanding of the proposition may undergo no change at all; what happens is that he now accepts as true what previously he merely understood. He no longer knows merely “the Scriptures teach Christ died for sinners”; he now knows “Christ died for sinners.”

While that may suffice as a refutation, at the same time, it may also be of help to provide more information on the subsequent historical events with an aim to set a fuller context for just what was important about the 1940s OPC debate. Last year, I wrote quite a long post on the question of intellectual "understanding" as well as the distinct question of whether unregenerates can "know" truth (link). 

Since then, I've come across further details. Something of a side note the The Calvin Forum is that Fled Klooster's 1951 dissertation on The Incomprehensibility of God in the Orthodox Presbyterian Conflict makes an elementary blunder on this subject. Klooster writes:

Clark holds that the proposition and the knowledge of the proposition are identical. Therefore since the proposition as an object of knowledge is the same for both God and man, their knowledge of that particular proposition in its minimal significance is also identical. The knowledge a regenerate man has of the proposition, "Christ died for our sins’, is also the same as that which an unregenerate may have. The only difference is that the regenerate believes it and appropriates it. Therefore even the knowledge an unregenerate man has of the proposition, Christ died for our sins, can be identical with God's knowledge of that proposition.

Notice that Clark never held that “Christ died for our sins” is something that unregenerates can know. One only has to read "The Answer" carefully to see that Clark held, "unregenerate man may understand the proposition “Christ died for sinners,” but far from knowing it to be true, he thinks it to be false."

Thus, Klooster makes a double mistake in 1) conflating Christ's dying for "our sins" (about which Clark never spoke in the context of unregenerates) with Christ's dying for "sinners" and 2) supposing Clark believed that unregenerates know the proposition "Christ died for sinners" (because unregenerates do not believe said proposition, Clark points out they cannot "know" it).

Returning to Gray's reference to a speech in which Clark silenced his critics, more information would be possible were it not for the unfortunate pragmatism that the minutes of church assemblies can be only so detailed. For example, the Thirteenth General Assembly of the OPC does not contain any record of Gray's following account which took place during said assembly: 

While much of the discussion has been too abstruse for the average person, one statement of Dr. Clark's has been widely quoted as. a simple and clear evidence of his "error." I refer to the words, "regeneration is not necessarily a change in understanding propositions" (such as "Christ died for sinners"). On the floor of the assembly Dr. Clark silenced the criticism of this statement by quoting from Berkhof's formulation of historical faith and James Buchanan's work on the Holy Spirit.  

It would be helpful to have the references Gray had in mind, and I'll return to this question below. 

Now, as I mentioned above, Gray was corresponding (sparring might be a better adjective) with Edward Heerema, a minister and son-in-law of R. B. Kuiper, an original signer of "The Complaint." Here is how Heerema replied to Gray's statement:

At one point Prof. R. B. Kuiper declared that a vote favoring Dr. Clark would not end the "Clark case'', as some had indicated in their remarks, but would rather for him be only the beginning, as he would fight for these "precious" doctrines to his dying breath... 

In his letter Mr. Gray asserts that on a particular point Dr. Clark "silenced" the criticism by quoting from two well-known authors. Whether Dr. Clark actually "silenced" his critics on this important point still remains to be seen, of course. 

It seems Heerema himself was not content to remain silent, for while there is no record (of which I'm aware) of an engagement with Clark's sources, he wrote a book called Whither the Orthodox Presbyterian Church? which, as reported by John Muether, "contained the absurd claim that Clark was an Arminian" (Cornelius Van Til: Reformed Apologist and Churchman, pg. 107). While I don't have access to Heerema's book, it seems he explains his reasoning in the April 1947 edition of The Calvin Forum: 

Men who take such a faulty and weak attitude toward the autonomous will of man that lies at the heart of Arminianism can be expected to have little trouble with Dr. Clark's notion of the autonomous intellect of man. The careful biblical theologian has always looked upon any concession to the autonomy of man as the theological poison. Views such as. those described above are quite out of harmony with Reformed theology's unqualified attitude on this fundamental and cardinal point. 

That Dr. Clark's theology has at its heart the conception of the autonomous intellect of man seems quite clear to the undersigned. He freely admits that he gets his definition of truth, not from exegetical considerations, but from "common sense." He has written that "regeneration ... is not a change in the understanding of these words (Christ died for sinners)." The same notion is imbedded in his article "On the Primacy of the Intellect" appearing in The Westminster Theological Journal of May, 1943. One of Dr. Clark's most ardent supporters is constantly stressing at every available opportunity that regenerate and unregenerate man have the knowing element (notitia) of saving faith in common, without distinction. 

It must be punctually observed that by no means all who voted in favor of Dr. Clark at the 1946 assembly subscribe to the views on Arminianism discussed above. Also, it must be noted that the above discussion must not be interpreted to indicate that Dr. Clark holds these views. Furthermore, I would not be understood as questioning the sincerity of the above-mentioned men in their profession of the Reformed faith. But that their views on the important matter in question are erroneous appears to the undersigned to admit of no serious doubt. 

This non sequitur by Heerema led to a response from Floyd Hamilton and Clark himself in the following issue. Clark's response to Heerema was terse:

Who these men are who hold to the autonomy of the will, I do not know. None of my friends hold such a view. But let them speak for themselves. 

What I wish particularly to make clear is that I do not and never have held to the autonomy of the intellect. Mr. Heerema's statement of my opinions is as far from the truth as it can possibly be. 

The unfortunate controversy about which Mr. Heerema writes would lose one of its unfortunate characteristics, if Mr. Heerema would determine what the truth is before he publishes his opinions. 

Hamilton's response is more extensive and covers a wider variety of issues than the subject of the regenerate or unregenerate intellect. I invite readers to peruse that on there own, but one valuable piece of information - which functions a something of a tangent to the foregoing - should not be missed: 

...this "program of action" was first conceived by four ministers in consultation on April 18th, a month after Clark had been passed for licensure by a large majority of presbytery. After sending out the first section in mimeographed form to a number of other ministers, suggestions were received, and it was put into final form, as quoted above, with the Specific Objectives added, on May 12th, 1944. Dr. Clark was licensed on July 7, 1944, and it was voted to ordain him, at that meeting. He was ordained shortly afterward. 

Mr. Heerema has put the cart before the horse in this matter. One of the factors that led to the formulation of the "program for action" was the determined opposition to Dr. Clark of the men who afterwards became the Complainants, at the March 20th, 1944, presbytery meeting. 

That is, Hamilton refutes something mentioned by Heerema in a previous issue: "that the 'program of action' to which Mr. Heerema refers (p. 196) was antecedent to the Clark Case." Hamilton's historical chronology helps correct a false caricature by Heerema regarding ulterior motives for Clark's ordination. 

It also serves to rectify the repetition of Heerema's mistake (and, frankly, glaring omission of Hamilton's correction) by Michael Hakkenburg in "The Battle over the Ordination of Gordon H. Clark, 1943-1948" (Pressing Toward the Mark, pgs. 343ff.), which John Muether once called "the best treatment of the Clark controversy" (link). Heerema backpedaled rather quickly in the next issue:

In this connection I wish to make a correction. In a previous letter (November 1946) I stated that "there were those who sought the ordination of Dr. Clark for the express purpose of gaining his ability and prestige to further a particular program of action in the church." In private correspondence some of Dr. Clark's most persistent supporters have disavowed such a motivation. I must recognize this disavowal, and am therefore glad to withdraw this particular statement regarding the attitude expressed in the "program for action" and accompanying correspondence. 

Sadly, Hakkenburg also fails to recognize this withdrawal. While the article is relatively nuanced, these exclusions lead him to a framing of the events of the 1940s that does not include important and relevant facts.

 

Heerema further responded to Hamilton and Clark with a blatant obfuscation: "I was not saying that any man in the O.P.C. held to 'the autonomy of the will'." I suppose an apology would have been too much to ask for? On the contrary, Heerema doubled-down and contradicted himself within the span of two paragraphs!

...both Mr. Hamilton and Dr. Clark reject my statements attributing to Dr. Clark a "notion of the autonomous intellect of man". Permit me to present one quotation from the Answer (to the original Complaint), and I shall let the reader decide the issue for himself. This is the quotation: "Both the regenerate and the unregenerate can with the same ease understand the proposition, Christ died for sinners. Regeneration, in spite of the theory of the Complaint, is not a change in the understanding of these words. The difference between the regenerate and the unregenerate lies in the fact that the former believes the proposition and the latter does not. The regenerate acknowledges Christ as Lord, the other does not. The one is a willing subject, the other is a rebel. Regeneration is not necessarily a change in understanding propositions. An unregenerate man may understand the proposition 'Christ died for sinners', but far from knowing it to be true, he thinks it to be false. Strictly speaking he knows only that 'the Scriptures teach Christ died for sinners'. When he is regenerated, his understanding of the proposition may undergo no change at all; what happens is that he now accepts as true what previously he merely understood. He no longer knows merely 'the Scriptures teach Christ died for sinners'; he now knows 'Christ died for sinners'." (p. 32f.), (By an autonomous intellect the undersigned means an intellect which, as intellect, can function in the process of salvation without being affected in that function either by total depravity or regeneration. In either state the intellect can understand propositions of saving truth. It is autonomous, then, in that it functions under its own power, without needing the enabling power of divine grace to function as intellect in the process of salvation.)

It is as if Heerema et al. - for Heerema reports that John Murray "made it plain at the assembly that the O.P.C. cannot tolerate the views of Clark, Hamilton, et alii, on the question of the effects of sin and regeneration on the intellect of man" - were oblivious to James 2:19. To affirm one understands (or even believes!) true (and theological!) propositions is an entirely distinct issue from total depravity and salvation. Merely understanding a true proposition is clearly insufficient for ethical good and salvation. "Autonomy" is a red herring.

That Heerema reports Hamilton was not sent to Korea because "he had left doubt in the minds of those on the committee as to the accuracy of his views on the influence of sin and regeneration on the human intellect" is a shameful admission. It is yet another fact which Hakkenburg fails to report.

Finally, to return to the aforementioned curiosity regarding which references Gray alluded to in Clark's speech during the OPC's thirteenth general assembly, I wondered whether it might be possible to find what Clark quoted. The following are my guesses. From James Buchanan's The Office and Work of the Holy Spirit:

Being an appropriate means, adapted to the faculties of the human mind, there can be no reason to doubt that the Bible, like any other book, may convey much instruction to an unrenewed man. When it is affirmed that a natural man cannot know the things of the Spirit of God, it is not implied that the Bible is unintelligibly written, or that he cannot understand the sense and meaning of scriptural propositions, so as to be able to give a rational account of them; for he may investigate the literal meaning of Scripture, and, in doing so, may attach a definite idea to many of its statements - may be able to see their mutual relations - to reason upon them, and even to expound them; and yet, in the scriptural sense, he may be in darkness notwithstanding. There are truths in the Bible which admit of being recognized, and even proved by natural reason, 'for the things of a man may be known by the spirit of man which is in him;' and even 'the things of the Spirit,' when revealed, may be so far understood as to affect and impress the mind which is nevertheless unconverted... 

The natural man is capable of acquiring, by the use of his rational faculties, such an acquaintance with the truths of God's Word as is sufficient to make him responsible for his treatment of it. Not to enlarge upon other points, let us take the doctrine which affirms the darkness of the human understanding, and the necessity of the enlightening grace of the Holy Spirit, which is often supposed to destroy the grounds of human responsibility in this respect; unless he be taught of God, he cannot have such an experimental knowledge of that doctrine as belongs to the exercised believer, and probably he will not submit to it; but it is stated, nevertheless, in plain intelligible language. He cannot read his Bible without being made aware that it contains this truth, nor can he exercise his understanding upon it, without acquiring some general knowledge of its import; and that knowledge, although neither spiritual nor saving, is amply sufficient as a ground of moral obligation. And farther, he may also learn from the same source, and in the same way, how it is that the enlightening grace of the Spirit is obtained, for he cannot read such passages as these: 'If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him;' and, 'If ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? - he cannot read such passages as these without forming some notion of prayer as the means by which his natural darkness may be dispelled; and if, notwithstanding his clear natural perception of such doctrines, he either refuses to believe them, or persists in neglecting prayer for the Holy Spirit, he must be dealt with hereafter on a very different principle, and tried by a very different rule of judgment from that which alone is applicable to those who have no Bible to teach them, or no rational mind to be taught. You cannot have sat under a Gospel ministry for years without acquiring such knowledge as is abundantly sufficient to lay you under the most weighty responsibilities... 

In Berkhof's The History of Christian Doctrines, my best guess is that Clark may have cited the following:

It asserted the doctrine of original sin in the strict sense of the word. Since Adam was the legal representative of all his descendants, the guilt of his first sin is imputed to them, and in consequence the corruption of human nature is also propagated to them. They are totally corrupt, that is, corrupt in every part of their being and so corrupt that they cannot do any spiritual good and cannot make a single effort to restore the broken relationship with God. At the same time the Canons also say: "There remain, however, in man since the fall, the glimmerings of natural light, whereby he retains some knowledge of God, of natural things, and of the difference between good and evil, and discovers some regard for virtue, good order in society, and for maintaining an orderly external deportment. But so far is this light of nature from being sufficient to bring him to a saving knowledge of God, that he is incapable of using it aright even in things natural and civil." III and IV, Art 4. 

Regeneration is regarded as strictly monergistic, and not at all as the work of God and man. Without regenerating grace no one can turn to God, and none can accept the offer of salvation apart from an efficient act of God founded on election. Yet salvation is offered in all seriousness to all who hear the Gospel on condition of faith and repentance. They who are lost will have only themselves to blame.

For readers who find this time period as fascinating as I do, I've recently written some thoughts on the alethiology of Clark and the complainants as well as on the seeming irrelevance of an "archetype-ectype" distinction to the 1940s debate here. Several of my posts include references to some as-yet unpublished material written by Clark.