This is a post in which I hope to round out some commentary on OPC critics of Gordon Clark. As I said in a recent and similar post (link; here and here are the other posts I've written), I cannot now dedicate time to responding to every such critic. Some men's material is book-length (at minimum). I am satisfied by my present efforts, though, and I look forward either to writing posts on other subjects or, as I really should be doing, returning to my transcription efforts on unpublished works of Clark, which have been slack. Below, I'll be analyzing works by Charles Dennison, Michael Horton, and John Muether.
Charles Dennison
The first critic with whom I'll interact is Charles Dennison, author of History of a Pilgrim People. I'll not repeat Robbins' critiques of this book (link). I recommend link two in paragraph 1 above for more information on the accurate timeline involving the "program of action."
I'll point out Robbins writes that some things in Dennison's book are "helpful" - as do I - as high praise as I think I've ever heard Robbins say of one who sides with Van Til rather than Clark. Generally, this is a book with quality information. I had to borrow a copy from an OPC friend and take numerous pictures, since no copies were available for below $125. I do hear it is being reprinted, however, which could explain the drop in price of currently available, used copies.
Dennison doesn't downplay the importance of the theological issues and offers some counter-historical claims to Frame's assertion that Van Til and Clark misunderstood each other; later, Muether will as well. He is certainly more measured than the authors mentioned in my last post, although like them (and just as Robbins says), he too nearly always fails to footnote a primary source for his more challenging intimations regarding Clark.
Thus, there are gaps. For example, Dennison tries to explain how the accusation that Clark was a hyper-Calvinist could have been correct given his OPC cohorts (e.g. Robert Strong, Richard Gray). They apparently "looked past his theological positions" (pg. 134). No evidence or specificity is given for or to any of this.
Most of what Dennison has to say about the 1940s debate is extremely short. Dennison also does not note that Clark not only distinguished God's knowledge and man's knowledge quantitatively but in respect to mode (pg. 133). He mentions Clark's view of the primacy of the intellect as one of the inciting issues and that for Van Til (emphasis mine), "Man's knowledge is like (analogous to) God's knowledge but it is not the same" (pg. 133). I'll discuss these topics later, under a different author, below.
What cannot be missed is that Dennison pictures Clark as a "front man" (his words) for a larger network of OPC churchmen who wished "to bring the church back to an American Presbyterianism of an evangelical stripe" (pgs. 133-134). Now, where the idea of a "front man" comes from, I don't know - it isn't footnoted in any author I've read who has made the claim. I do, however, recommend the following writings by Clark - written around the time of the controversy - so readers can see if they find anything objectionable or anti-Reformed about his position on Christianity and culture: link, link ("The Next War").
Dennison's thesis - a negative view of the so-called "evangelical stripe" defended by Clark et al. - depends on his view of Machen (and our relationship to him) being correct: "Because we in the OPC lack a cultural tie, we lack an indigenous American identity and a route to larger appeal. This cross has been difficult first us to bear. So far we have been unwilling to abandon it, possibly because we sensed our relationship to Machen would never be the same if we did" (pg. 7).
What of North's interpretation of Machen (see my last post)? And are we really going to suggest we should follow Machen in all respects? Dennison doesn't (pg. 13ff.), and North's book shows Machen had his faults. I'm also somewhat skeptical of the idea that OPC churchmen dwell on their "relationship" to Machen concerning this whole question.
There are a few ways of framing the issue. One is to ask, as Dennison does, are we better off "culturally disenfranchised," without an "establishment identity" (pg. x)? For example, can the church without this identity "better declare God's word? advise foes? manifest a true catholicity? be a servant in the world for the sake of the Savior whose kingdom is not of the world? If it can, we dare not shrink from such a liberation..."?
Wait - what if it can't? A church can always serve in the ways Dennison describes, but I've noticed a persistent theme in OPC literature on this point: to leave questions about whether cultural engagement is better or not in the hypothetical and to assume the very point at issue. What if our being honest about the horrors of sin that are perpetuated, regulated, or even legislated and enforced in our country enables us to "better declare God's word" et al.?
If Dennison considers his position a liberation, what would he consider this hypothetical requirement? Or, what is the antonym of liberation? Since I can speak in hypotheticals as easily as Dennison, if the church is, say, supposed to speak (to political representatives, even!) and act on behalf of the oppressed in society, wouldn't it be quite ironic for Dennison to think of the hypothetical requirement I'm presenting as itself oppressive?
What are the best arguments Dennison has? One is a series of rhetorical questions. From pg. 40: "...in the culture, is [the church] to dominate? Take over? Is she the purveyor of some sort of religious imperialism? Or is she to seek marriage with the culture and become indistinguishable from it?" These hyperboles are quite a far distance, though, from Dennison's original contention that "Simply put, the OPC has no cultural or social agenda" (pg. 7).
A better argument, I think, would be to bring to the forefront what some OPC theologians have alluded to but not explored deeply when it comes to this topic: eschatology. Dennison notes that it was linked to "the new Westminster apologetic" (pgs. 111ff.) by Buswell, but Dennison too seems to leave the point to others to debate and discover. I'm speaking here of the implicit amillennialism of a number of authors whom I have mentioned have written about or commentated on this topic. I mentioned one framing of the issue earlier, here is another: is this being argued as a part of our denominational identity?
If so, it needs to be made explicit. Further argumentation would be also needed that amillennialism encourages some kind of ecclesiastic invisibility or silence. Whereas Dennison views his position as liberating, I would think ecclesiastic freedom to speak and act on current, cultural events would be more liberating. The OPC has even seemingly done this prior to the time of Dennison's publication (link).
Muether and Hart do at least make explicit, in Fighting the Good Fight, that "the leaders of the OPC fully embraced the teaching of amillennialism as the view on Christ’s return most consistent with Scripture." Muether and Hart are referring to the Westminster faculty of the time. But I don't find any clear indication that amillennialism was a mark of the OPC's identity. Clark rejected amillennialism as a founding member and leader, although he accepted that "In this world the Christian is a pilgrim and a stranger" (Readings in Ethics, 1931, chapter on Early Christianity).
It is obviously not in the scope of this post to attempt to answer which eschatological view is more or less true. There is another wrinkle here, however: dispensational premilennarians split from the OPC in 1937. Granted, they left for reasons not exclusive to eschatology, but when they formed the Bible Presbyterian Church, the former OPC members who split off made changes to the Westminster Standards "to reflect the premillennial doctrine held by the founders of the synod" (link).
Clearly, eschatology had some role in the 1937 split. This could be taken to mean the OPC had a distinctive eschatological identity after all, or it could simply mean the OPC by and large rejected the pretribulational premillennarian (and often dispensational) theology of those who left. The latter seems more likely to me, since, as the Bible Presbyterian Church members themselves implicitly acknowledged by attempting to reformulate them, the Westminster Standards as accepted by the OPC don't specify one millennial position as correct.
Either way, Clark's recommendation to become a member in the American Council of Christian Churches, stated at the OPC's twelfth general assembly (link), was a recommendation to regarding a council founded by the leader of those who split off from the OPC in 1937 to help form the Bible Presbyterian Church: Carl McIntire (see Dennison's chapter on Tragedy).
Clark was, of course, also formerly employed by his friend, J. Oliver Buswell, another OPC member who split with McIntire in 1937 - who is credited with partially convincing Clark of premillennarianism by the time he was hired at Wheaton College (where Buswell was president), in 1937. Although Clark remained in the OPC and maintained a fundamentally different position on premillennialism than the Bible Presbyterian Church members, the two remained in friendly correspondence.
In 1937, we see an indication of how members who were soon to split from the OPC perceived treatment against their views by who Muether and Hart regard as the leaders of the OPC. In a recorded statement from the third general assembly (link), we read: "Mr. Laird resigned from the Board of Westminster Seminary on April 27 because the seminary had in recent months turned from exposure and attack upon modernism to an attack upon premillennialism."
The open question is whether eschatology was relevant to the 1940s OPC debate. In short, did these same leaders - the Westminster faculty - see it as a success when in Clark, another advocate (and perhaps advocates, depending on what were the eschatological views of others who left the OPC with Clark) for premillennialism left the OPC... or was this largely unrecognized as an after- or non-thought?
A subject worthy of further research, I can only offer a few comments before I leave most of it for another time or person to pursue. Those interested are encouraged to pay careful attention to Dennison's chapter on Vos and the "otherworldliness" of the Christian religion (pg. 85ff.). Compare Daryl Hart, who uses the same language here and, as I recall, in his book on The Lost Soul of American Protestantism.
The key question, I think, is what does the "not yet" part of history look like. In his last sentence to his chapter on Clark and others, Dennison says, the OPC "has been stamped with an other-worldliness and waits for further help as to how she, rather than seeking to regain the world she has lost, might be of service to her Lord in the world" (pg. 136). On and for what is the OPC waiting?
It is true that Adam had a pre-redemptive eschatological goal and that Christ has already granted to His people eschatological blessings (pg. 85). But is the Christian religion "otherworldly" in the sense that we lose all touch with our life as pilgrims as we look to Christ's return? Dennison correctly notes that the "wholly-other" god of neo-orthodoxy "generated their own irrelevance" (pg. 100) - is he in similar danger here with respect to the church?
Michael Horton
In biblical thought, truth is not simply the correspondence of words to things—a mirror of the eternal forms. It is a stance taken in relation to reality as God’s creation and to oneself as God’s creature—which creature in the covenant of grace is rightly related (justified) and rightly ordered (by the new birth and sanctification) to God’s purposes for human flourishing (pg. 132).
Were it true that Dr. Clark affirmed a propositional character of divine knowledge it would appear that he had made a temporal form fundamental to the archetypal knowledge of God, which would indeed be making truth fundamentally quantitative. The perfect unity of the knowledge of God would be subjected to a manifold of propositional units temporal in their character.
Horton's follow-up - in which he finally brings up Van Til - is baffling. He quotes a passage from Van Til's The Defense of the Faith to the effect that "Our knowledge of God is not and cannot be comprehensive," and then Horton immediately says of this, "In his debate with Gordon Clark, Van Til defended the classical Reformed insistence on this distinction" (pg. 136).
As far back as the Fourth Lateran Council, even the medieval church recognized that in ever analogy between God and humans, there is always more dissimilarity than similarity.Granting this account is true, Clark's point is that there is similarity at all. Similarity (and analogy) presuppose univocity. Two things cannot be similar if there not any sort of overlap between them. But that's just to say that God is not completely Other, and neither is His knowledge.
...not even the glorified saints in heaven overcome the Creator-creature distinction in their epistemology any more than in their ontology.All knowledge of God, therefore, is analogical rather than univocal. (pg. 137)
After a few pages discussing other theologians, Horton returns to Clark. He may be correct that "Clark was apparently unaware that there even was such a thing as Protestant scholasticism" (pg. 143). On the other hand, on the same page, one can compare Clark's own words to Horton's interpretation of them to see that Horton has badly misunderstood and misrepresented Clark. Here is Horton:
Professor Clark not only fails to properly define analogy; he conflates analogy with “metaphorical or symbolic” language as employed by “the adherents of the dialectical theology” (ibid.). Analogy is distinguished from metaphorical or symbolic approaches in that it affirms the literal truth of its language while not reducing the relation of the two terms to one of identity. The view that all religious language is metaphorical or symbolic is simply a hyper-allegorical view that has nothing in common with an analogical view.Here is what Clark actually says in the source material Horton cites (link):
Now Van Til's comment on Thomism is not that analogy is a fruitless expedient, but, quite the reverse, that Romanism does not take analogy seriously enough (p. 56). Romanism still retains too much, shall we say, univocity. Not Christian thought, but, says Van Til, "Non-Christian philosophies hold that human thought is univocal instead of analogical" (p. 65). In view of the fact that Romanism allows univocal predication in the sphere of science and of ordinary experience, Van Til's assertion is most easily understood to mean that univocal predication is impossible for man in any subject. In this Van Til shows a close affinity to neo-orthodoxy. The adherents of the dialectical theology teach that all language, or all religious language, is analogical, metaphorical, or symbolic. Not language only, but conceptual knowledge also. Intellectual knowledge, Es-Wahrheit, is only a pointer, a pointer to something that cannot be thought. Therefore creeds are not to be taken univocally or literally, but in some analogical and therefore undefined meaning.Clark doesn't "define" analogy, he just outlines what dialectical theology teaches and compares that to "Van Til's assertion," "...most easily understood to mean that univocal predication is impossible for man in any subject." Horton's own statement that a true definition of analogy "affirms the literal truth of its language while not reducing the relation of the two terms to one of identity" doesn't go deep enough into the questions already asked regarding whether similarity and analogy presuppose overlap.
I have probably repeated myself too many times, but here is Horton's final reference to Clark, found in his conclusion:
Evangelical apologists (as well as biblical scholars, theologians, and pastors) are increasingly divided as to how to respond to the crisis of modernity. On one hand are those who apparently cling to the modern project, identifying the crumbling of autonomous foundationalism with the demise of truth itself, Many of these writers carry on the apologetic strategies of Gordon Clark, the medieval synthesis, or evidentialism—usually a combination of these.
But Christianity has never depended on the success or failure of the empires that wax and wane. The “crisis of Western civilization” is not the same as “the crisis of Christianity.” Reformed theology, as we have seen, has long been a critic of the idolatries of the former and can continue to guide our response to the current situation. (pgs. 147-148)
Perhaps some evangelical apologists rely on the apologetic of Clark et al. to respond to the "crisis of modernity." Does Horton mean to intimate these writers conflate said crisis with "the crisis of Christianity"? What if they didn't? Who are these nameless people?
More importantly, Clark himself did not think "Christianity... depended on the success or failure of the empires that wax and wane." The following might almost be mistaken to be a direct response to Horton, except that Clark wrote it over 50 years beforehand:
It is true, I admit, that while rejecting Spengler's political theory and underlying philosophy, I agree that civilizations have come and gone, empires waxed and waned, and that the U.S.A. will probably not last forever; in fact I hold that our government has deteriorated considerably in the past twenty years; I hold too that the total depravity of man makes political deterioration inevitable and that the only permanent government will be the Kingdom of our Lord Christ. Perhaps this is cynical (i.e. snarling, contemptuous, misanthropic, pessimistic, and gloomy); modernists and humanists regularly say that it is; but I hold that it is unadulterated Christian truth. (link)
John Muether
One final critic I want to analyze is John Muether. I discussed his book co-authored with Daryl Hart in my last post. This one will look at his book, Cornelius Van Til: Reformed apologist and churchman (link). For that reason, this review will be disproportionately longer. Dennison's book covered the entire OPC's history, so Clark references were present but not as prolific. Horton's article was decidedly shorter, of course.
Muether's book was informative in a few ways. For example, I didn't know Van Til was invited but declined to participate in Clark's festschrift (pg. 112). Also, this early comment caught my eye:
Readers of Van Til are familiar with his genealogy of non-Reformed apologetics: Aquinas led to Bishop Butler’s analogy, which begot Charles Hodge, who produced Buswell and Clark. (pg. 56)Clark would have been shocked to be told his apologetic forefather was Aquinas, a man whose apologetic he refuted repeatedly. This somewhat explains "the Butler type of analogy comment from Van Til's lecture cited in my last post on "Clark's Critics." From Rushdoony's By What Standard?, we read:
Van Til is emphatic on the fallacy of all attempts to establish a principle of interpretation other than God. If, after the fashion of Thomas Aquinas and Bishop Butler, we establish a neutral principle of coherence or rationality, or like Clark and Carnell, enthrone the law of contradiction, two major concessions are involved. First, we reason from man’s principle to God and enthrone our law over God as basic to all human and divine process. (pg. 22)There's the connection, I think. Van Til thought Aquinas, Butler, Clark, and so forth reasoned from a "principle of interpretation other than God." Rushdoony also mentions that Christianity is only probably (i.e. not certainly) true for at least a few of these men. I addressed this in my last post, so I won't dwell on it here, but I'm glad if I have found some clarification of what Van Til and Muether meant.
We went through the same sort of struggle in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church with Dr. Clark. He insisted that there was exact identity of content in the mind of man with the content of the mind of God in his knowledge. Over against this view we argued that man as the creature of God is analogical of God in his knowledge. And we stressed the fact that this meant a one way dependence of man on God. Clark argued that such a view led to equivocism in knowledge.For all Clark's efforts, years after the controversy, Van Til was still perpetuating what Clark once called "incomprehensible" "false statements" (link). Clark constantly called for precision and, in his mind at least, rarely received it. It is not whether the content is an exact identity (as if we are omniscient), it's whether the what content man has and what content God has means the same - refers to the same object of knowledge (truth). If so, Clark's position is vindicated. If not, then there really is not qualitative overlap between God's knowledge and ours, and it is equivocal to even speak of man's "content" and God's "content" of knowledge.
...as far apart as they were, Barth and Clark shared the common error of a defective starting point, a non-Christian doctrine of creation. No theologian of Van Til's time had a more robust doctrine of creation or explored as fully as Van Til its covenantal character and its philosophical consequences. He often asserted that creation is the foundation stone of Reformed theology. "The most fundamental distinction of orthodox theology, he wrote in The New Modernism, "may be said to be that of Creator and creature."
In other words, Van Til thought Clark did not respect enough the distinction between Creator and creature. Obviously, this involves the doctrine of creation. I said enough on this, I think, in my interaction with Horton, especially in that no Christian (such as Clark) denies a distinction. The question is whether there is a Creator-creature distinction (true) or an absolute divide, dissimilarity, or chasm (false). I don't think it is Clark who missteps here.
Despite the above information - making the book worth the read - Muether gets many things wrong. He says on pgs. 187 and 201 that Van Til "refused to link" Clark with the "new evangelicals." On the contrary, we saw in my last post that Van Til's 1967 lecture on The New Evangelicalism featured Clark quite prominently as an alleged member of this group. Muether's evidence is, according to an endnote, a 1963 letter to Ronald Nash, but Muether doesn't provide the contents of this letter (perhaps he changed his mind within 4 years; I doubt it).
Muether also makes reference to Clark's "hyper-Calvinistic leanings" with no evidence to support the assertion (pg. 272). The only other time hyper-Calvinism is mentioned is on pg. 107, and that just says "some in the OPC suspected" Clark "of hyper-Calvinism." This is Dennison redux.
Granted, pg. 272 is found in a sort of appendix called Bibliographic Essay, in which Muether attempts to hurriedly summarize and sometimes provide passing comment on source material, but for that matter, the entire paragraph in which this accusation is found was written in poor taste. It implies that the work of men like Robert Strong and John Frame can be dismissed because they left the OPC - they are "marred by their disillusionment with their former church." Would it be fair to dismiss Muether's work as "marred by his enamourment with his current church"?
The bulk of Muether's attention toward Clark occurs from pages 98-116. Now, as I said in my last post, I don't really want to go over ground that I think has been sufficiently covered elsewhere. For example, Doug Douma explains why Clark did not return to the OPC in The Presbyterian Philosopher during the 1980s, a fact which Muether raises (pg. 251). And I've said elsewhere that there may be something to the idea the 1940s OPC debate - as I neutrally refer to it nowadays - is "better described as the Clark-Murray debate" as opposed to Clark-Van Til (link). This same link, though, refutes Muether's following attempt to water down the significance of Clark's nomination of Machen as the first OPC moderator. Here is Muether:
As a ruling elder in the church since its inception in 1936, Gordon Clark (1902-85) was well known in the denomination, and it was he who nominated J. Gresham Machen as the moderator of that first Assembly. (Clark’s nomination of Machen does not mean that he was an especially close intimate of Machen’s. Machen was surely everyone’s choice as the inaugural moderator of the church, and Clark simply beat other nominators to the floor. Similarly, Van Til’s nomination of Buswell as the moderator of the second assembly was no indication of a close bond between those two.) (pg. 100)
And here is what actually happened:
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.
Clark didn't beat others nominate Machen before anyone else, as if he was seeking the personal honor. Machen himself (and John Murray, for that matter) were among those who orchestrated ahead of time that Clark would be given the honor. I don't expect Muether or any historian to have all the facts before them. But Muether's suggestion that Clark may not have been a "close intimate of Machen's" shows some ignorance of source material - Clark-Machen letters, the Reformed Fellowship, the League of Evangelical Students, etc.
Speaking of this, as with Dennison and Horton, source material is really needed where Muether provides none. The following has no endnote (by the way, endnotes are infinitely inferior to footnotes), nor is a date even mentioned:Greater differences began to emerge when Van Til solicited Clark’s feedback on his metaphysics syllabus. In his response, Clark wrote that there was nothing objectionable in the human pursuit of comprehensive knowledge of God. Clark argued that it was sinful to aspire to God’s being but not to his knowledge.Compare this to Clark's answers during his ordination exam. Here is part of his exchange with Reverend Clelland:
Q You believe the statement in Chapter 2. Section 1, that the one only living and true God is incomprehensible?
A I believe that there are indications in Scripture that when we shall be glorified, our knowledge will continue to increase forever, and that in all probability there will be no end to such increase.
Q That there will always be then, something which we could not yet comprehend?
A It seems to me entirely likely, though the exegeses of it are a little weak, but it seems to me entirely likely that there will always be certain particular truths that we do not know.
Later that same spring Clark published “On the Primacy of the Intellect” in the Westminster Theological Journal. Van Til again pressed Clark on the Creator-creature distinction, fearing that Clark’s argument failed to distinguish between a Christian and a pagan understanding of the intellect. Van Til cited Calvin and Warfield to argue that the intellect was no less fallen than other human faculties. Further conversations confirmed for Van Til his suspicion that Clark’s thought was deeply grounded in Greek philosophy; Van Til summed up Clark’s position in the Socratic motto that “knowledge is virtue.”
To be sure, Van Til was willing to affirm the primacy of the intellect in a certain sense: coming to faith is no mere act of emotional enthusiasm. But Van Til believed that faith is deeper than mere assent, because the Word of God makes an impact on the believer’s heart. Van Til feared that Clark’s exclusive emphasis on assent to doctrine denied the demands that Scripture places on the whole man. The Bible shapes what one knows, but also what one loves and how one behaves.
I have read Clark's article on The Primacy of the Intellect (1943) very closely and do not find that Clark says anything remotely close to the idea our intellect was or is unfallen. Nor does Clark even discuss saving faith. Muether's point about "Clark's exclusive emphasis on assent" indicates he is conflating of what Clark believed later in his life with what he believed earlier in it; or if Muether means Van Til argues this against Clark in the 1940s, I want to see where he does this.
The evidence I can find against this idea is only indirect, but here is a snippet from an article in The Presbyterian Guardian (link). Note that there is no indication that Clark disagreed that there were three elements of saving faith:
Mr. Hamilton then again rose to deliver another paper on the relation between regeneration and human understanding, which again he said had received Dr. Clark's approval. Confusion was injected, however, by the interpolation of some of Mr. Hamilton's own observations which had not been approved by Dr. Clark. In the course of the speech, Mr. Hamilton declared that notitia (knowledge) and assensus (assent) could be possessed by the unregenerate man but that fiducia (trust) could not. These are three theological terms to designate the three elements of saving faith. Mr. Hamilton was promptly challenged for holding that the unregenerate man possesses two-thirds of the elements of saving faith. On this position, said the complainants, the only thing wrong with the unregenerate man is that his saving faith is one-third incomplete. Moreover, since the answer terms assent the central element in faith, the unregenerate man might then, on Mr. Hamilton's position, be said to possess the central element of saving faith.
Mr. Hamilton then said that he had just been told that Dr. Clark would not agree that the unregenerate man was in possession of the first two of the three elements, but only of the first.
Now, I have read Clark's 1943 article was the tipping point for some concern among men in the OPC. But I have not heard sufficient explanation - with references to the actual article itself - as to why. Clark summarizes the positions of philosophers and theologians, occasionally remarks on which thoughts they had were good or bad, discusses emotions, volition, and intellect as activities (not divided parts) of a man, and then argues that the intellect has primacy because it is that by which we will enjoy God forever. This appears to me to be unrelated to what Muether mentions about the fallenness of the intellect and definition of faith, but since he cites no sources, I have no idea what to think.
What, then, was the problem? I'll provide some facts and then some speculation. It is a fact that Clark wrote letters - some dating back to at least 1938 - and likely had conversations with Van Til, Buswell, and perhaps others relating to the content of the final article seen in 1943. How Clark's understanding was interpreted in those writings and discussions he had with others prior to the publishing of the 1943 product may have been the underlying cause for concern. An example that comes to mind would be that in "The Primacy of the Intellect," Clark writes:
...voluntarism conceived reality as fundamentally irrational, as ultimately an unknowable mystery before which man must remain a skeptic; whereas intellectualism with a love of truth resolutely affirms that reality is essentially rational, logical, and knowable.
While this may seem innocuous at first glace, it would possibly recall to Van Til's mind (and Buswell's, who read and agreed with Van Til's letter) a letter he wrote to Clark on December 5th, 1938 (link):
If we say that the real is the rational and the rational is the real we must apply this first to God as He exists by Himself apart from the created world. To that we must add the doctrine of creation into nothing. Thus we make a basic distinction between the reach of God's intellect and the reach of man's intellect.
Reality, uncreated reality, divine reality may and must, it seems to me, be forthwith identified with rationality. God's consciousness and His being are coextensive; His being and His attributes are one. Created reality too is rational in the sense that whatsoever comes to pass happens in accord with the counsel of God. On the other hand God might have created the universe otherwise than He did. There might be various rational ways of existing for the created universe. Hence with respect to the created universe we cannot say that the rational is the real.
There is no prior (nor posterior) letter of which I'm aware that was written by Clark to provide context to this. Clark, who gave Buswell access to this letter with Clark's notes in the margins, tells Buswell in a different letter that Van Til quotes him (Clark) from a previous discussion they had, so an in-person conversation may have precipitated Van Til's above letter. Regardless, Van Til is correct to mention God's freedom. To say "the rational is the real" implies creation was and is necessary, that there is a single intelligible world (with Creator and creation) which can comprise reality. This ruins numerous doctrines.
In an ironic, prophetic twist on Clark's negative view of the word "exists" later in his life, Buswell (writing to Clark; letter dated January 26, 1939) adds to Van Til's criticisms: "If you mean that the rational is the whole of reality, then the word rational ceases to have any meaning." Buswell also dislikes a comment Clark wrote in the margins of Van Til's letter. Clark highlighted Van Til's statement that "with respect to the created universe we cannot say that the rational is the real" and wrote in the margins, "In which case the world cannot be known." But Clark's reply to Buswell in a letter from February 9, 1939 somewhat clarifies matters on all these points:
You are perhaps unduly exercised about my note at the top of page two of Van Til’s letter. In reading a letter I sometimes jot down notes hurriedly to guide me in my reply. Van Til said the rational is not the real with respect to the created universe. You take this to mean that there are ideas in God’s mind which are not realized in creation. Quite true; but whether God might have created some other sort of world is a slightly different question, on which Augustine and Anselm disagree... Very consciously I tried to avoid this particular problem in my paper. So there is not the profundity in my note at the top of p.2 of Van Til’s letter which you find there. As a matter of fact, I had in mind the notion that the real is not rational (granted that is not what he said) and I drew the conclusion that it could then not be an object of knowledge.In other words, Clark wrote a note quickly that didn't respond to what Van Til said but still was of use in that Clark believed both uncreated and created reality must be rational. Clark then used that idea in his article on "The Primacy of the Intellect": reality is rational. The final product does not suggest the converse, and this is where a careful reading is required.
To my knowledge, Van Til was not aware of Clark's exchange with Buswell. That's one reason which may have contributed to any worry Van Til and/or other of his acquaintances may have had about the 1943 article. Another might be the further suggestions that the discussions between Van Til and Clark revolving around Van Til's December 5th letter definitely contributed to Clark's 1943 article. For example:
- From both Van Til's letter and the 1943 article (Van Til may have been quoting Clark from a prior conversation): "Life is not deeper than logic."
- Van Til from his letter: "As we say, personality is a unit, which thinks and wills and loves. Psychologically we may and must speak of the priority of the intellect but not logically." On the other hand, Clark from the 1943 article: "Each man is a single personality... The question at issue, then, treats not of the temporal order but of the logical order, or to repeat more exactly, of an order determined by the degree to which these actions unite us to God." This indicates a disagreement between Van Til and Clark.
- Another disagreement is that Clark speaks of intellect as the only "mode of action" by which our telos can be fulfilled, i.e. to contemplate God. Clark: "if in Christianity the end of all human endeavor is to see or contemplate God, evidently the desire for God or the love of God is subordinate." Contrast this to Van Til: "The 'vision of deity' is no more ultimate as an end for man than the love of deity or the work for deity" (vision of deity is in quotes because Van Til is quoting Clark).
Perhaps more examples could be given, but this sufficiently shows that "The Primacy of the Intellect" was long in the making. Clark definitively staked out a different position than Van Til. But to assert Clark's position was "pagan" or "grounded in Greek philosophy" takes a little more effort to substantiate, especially since these do not deal with Clark's arguments.
Should the church cooperate with other forms of conservative Protestantism in America? Or ought it to preserve its distinctively Reformed identity? How could the church best combat the modernism of its day: by joining the emerging evangelical movement or by defending and propagating the Westminster Standards? (pg. 103)This is an unjustified dichotomy. It presupposes a both-and answer isn't possible. Maybe that's true, but it isn't obvious to me, and it is more or less an unargued assumption in many of the OPC historical works I've read. See my interaction with Dennison above.
As an aside, though, I'd like to mention a point that often gets brushed over: the procedural question. Take the Presbytery of Philadelphia, which was found to be in error on failing to follow the Form of Government in acting too hastily regarding Clark's examination process. This is usually all that is said about the matter, but minutes from the Presbytery of Ohio tell a different story. The following is a communication to the 14th OPC General Assembly recorded in the Ohio Presbytery's minutes from the their meeting on April 8, 1947:
The four ministers who reside within the bounds of the Presbytery of Ohio were compelled, by their calling and by the failure of the Thirteenth General Assembly to finish its business in five days, to return to their pressing duties and to miss the final sessions of that Assembly. It is common knowledge that commissioners from other Presbyteries also were likewise compelled to miss the final sessions.
The Presbytery of Ohio therefore requests the Fourteenth General Assembly to make strenuous efforts to finish its business before too many of the commissioners must leave.
If this is impossible, the Presbytery of Ohio implores the Fourteenth General Assembly, in the interests of justice, not to make decisions in the final sessions on matters of vital importance to the Church as a whole; but to confine its actions to routine matters.
Some of us came out of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A., and we know the practice of deferring important matters to the closing session. This practice is not conducive to justice and fair dealing. The Thirteenth General Assembly in the evening session of its last day, after a noticeable proportion of the commissioners had left, took action with regard to a matter that had presumably been settled three days previously. This action was taken after the time limit for reconsideration had expired.
The injustice of this action is further seen in the fact that that Assembly, diminished in numbers, elected a quasi-judicial committee in which one of the interested parties but not the other of the interested parties was represented.
The Presbytery of Ohio therefore prayerfully implores the Fourteenth General Assembly to proceed with justice and equity.
Sincerely yours, MARTIN J. BOHN,
Stated Clerk Presbytery of Ohio
These minutes confirm Clark and the only three other ministers of his presbytery (4 total - Thomas Gregory was ordained later that year as a 5th member) missed the final, Monday sessions of the 13th OPC General Assembly. This is important, as it was during these late, final sessions that the following occurred (link):
It was moved and carried that this Assembly instruct the Clerk of the Assembly to inform the Presbytery of Philadelphia of the action of the Assembly, to wit, that “this Assembly finds that there is ground for complaint against the Presbytery of Philadelphia and declares that the Presbytery of Philadelphia, at its meeting on July 7, 1944, erred in the decision to deem the examination sufficient for ordination, and in the decision to ordain Dr. Gordon H. Clark at a subsequent meeting of the Presbytery called for that purpose, in that the Presbytery failed to observe the plain intent of the provisions of the Form of Government (XIV, 1 and XV, ll), in circumstances which made the propriety of these provisions apparent.” This Assembly also. implores the Presbytery of Philadelphia to make acknowledgment of these errors and of its failure thereby to preserve the peace of the Church, and to report accordingly to the Fourteenth General Assembly...
It was moved that:
Whereas the purity and the peace of The Orthodox Presbyterian Church are of the deepest concern to the General Assembly, and
Whereas “to the General Assembly. . . belongs the power of deciding in all controversies regarding doctrine . . ." (Form of Government, XI, 5), and
Whereas there has appeared to be a difference in our Church concerning the Scriptural teaching pertaining to the doctrines of the incomprehensibility of God, the position of the intellect in reference to other faculties, the relation of divine sovereignty and human responsibility, and. the free offer of the gospel,
Be it resolved that Messrs. Murray, Clowney, R. Gray, W. Young and Stonehouse be appointed to study these doctrines in the light of Scripture and the Westminster Standards in relation to all expressions of views on the doctrines that have appeared or may appear in connection with the discussion of the Complaint against the Presbytery of Philadelphia in the matter of the licensure and ordination of Dr. Gordon H. Clark, for the purpose of clarifying these matters, and report to the Fourteenth General Assembly.
In other words, Clark left the 13th General Assembly unaware that of what happened in the Monday afternoon and evening sessions, including the movement made to form a study committee stacked with ministers whom he, as an "interested party," found no representation. This is all the more important when one considers Muether's point that:
Strictly speaking the General Assembly never addressed the substance of the complaint against Clark. Instead, it assigned the theological issues of the debate to study committees that reported over the course of three years, and these reports were distributed to congregations for their study. (pg. 103)
I don't find (and this could be my mistake) any reference in the minutes for the 13th General Assembly as to how this committee was elected - or how the committee itself was even proposed. Three of the five members were from the study committee formed by the 12th General Assembly; Stonehouse surely would not have been viewed as a welcome addition by Clark. The Ohio presbytery's allusion to the injustice of the PCUSA is quite striking - Clark is nearly being styled as a new Machen.
If not a procedural error, the Ohio Presbytery certainly was not happy with the conduct of the 13th General Assembly. Sympathizers with Clark (and Clark himself) appear to have had good reason to be upset at important decisions - decisions about presbytery fault and committees which would inform and color the minds of OPC commissioners less able to devote time to study of the issues in The Complaint and The Answer - made during extra meetings without any prior indication given to officers who had to leave at the expected time.
Here's how the 14th General Assembly's COMMITTEE ON OVERTURES AND COMMUNICATIONS responded to the Ohio Presbytery:
8. With regard to the communication from the Presbytery of Ohio imploring the Assembly to conclude important business in five days, the committee recommends that the Assembly take cognizance.
The final note on how the 14th General Assembly itself reacted to this recommendation is anti-climactic:
It was moved and carried that the Assembly take no action on the eighth recommendation.
So, after all, the Presbytery of Philadelphia was "implored" to acknowledge error, and it did so... barely. Muether reports that "The Presbytery registered its contrition by the slim margin of 16-14" (pg. 103). Well, if the imploring occurred after many interested commissioners went home - again, not a procedural error, but, perhaps, a bad look - the reticence of some members of the Philadelphia presbytery makes sense.
Clark would later rebuff his old Philadelphia presbytery for an actual procedural mistake in his tenure within the Ohio Presbytery:
The Presbytery of Ohio of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church hereby replies to the Presbytery of Philadelphia, relative to the latter's complaint dated July 21, 1947:
The said complaint states that the Presbytery of Ohio acted illegally in receiving licentiate Thomas M. Gregory. The ground alleged in support of this charge is an action of the complaining Presbytery relative to granting licentiate Thomas M. Gregory a letter of dismissal.
The Presbytery of Ohio wishes it to be known that its action commenced with the presentation of the letter of dismissal. The Form of Government, Chapter XX, states, "It shall be the duty of the clerk... to grant extracts from them (the minutes) whenever properly required; and such extracts under the hand of the clerk shall be considered as authentic vouchers of the fact which they declare, in any ecclesiastical judicatory and to every part of the church."
Whatever method the Presbytery of Philadelphia chose to follow in granting the letter of dismissal could not properly have been and was not a matter for the Presbytery of Ohio to act upon.
The Presbytery of Philadelphia seems to believe that Mr. Gregory was not a resident of the state of Indiana when he was received by the Presbytery of Ohio. The fact of the matter is that Mr. Gregory has established residence in Indiana before he was received. However, this has no bearing on the case, and the Presbytery of Ohio repudiates the notion that such a consideration was or ought to have been before it. The Presbytery of Ohio received Mr. Gregory on the basis of a regular letter of dismissal from the Presbytery of Philadelphia. There is nothing illegal in such a procedure.
The Presbytery of Philadelphia in the second part of the same complaint charges that the Presbytery of Ohio ordained Mr. Gregory illegally. The ground alleged in support of this charge is that Mr. Gregory had no call warranting ordination.
The Presbytery of Ohio replies that the determination of such a question of fact lies in the discretion of the examining Presbytery. Questions of fact that are placed in the discretion of Presbyteries cannot be reviewed by another Presbytery or even by a higher court. An attempt to sit in judgment on matters within the discretion of another Presbytery is in effect an attempt to destroy Presbyterian polity. If such a complaint were allowed standing in a court, it would mean that every ordination and every action of every Presbytery might have to await the approval of the Presbytery of Philadelphia. The Presbytery of Ohio therefore is compelled to reject the complaint addressed to it by the Presbytery of Philadelphia.
Clark (who wrote the above) defended the ordination of a man against the very Presbytery which questioned his own ordination. The Presbytery of Philadelphia seems to have backed off, and Mr. Gregory's ordination stood.
Perhaps these observations are incidental to Muether, but as much as I have heard OPC historians remark that the broader ecclesiastic and cultural views played a bigger role in the 1940s debate than some have thought - it's not all just about the theology - I haven't heard as much about the loosely "procedural" dimensions. There is much background context to the 1940s debate that has not been available to the public, so I thought to include some of that context here just as example of how much influence one can have (or try to have) without relevant parties (Clark, OPC commissioners) even being present.
Moving on, Muether's summary of the incomprehensibility of God question (pgs. 104-105) is typical and does not need comment, especially since I've already said so much about that. What is worth comment is Muether's following citation of Robert Strong, a supporter of Clark. Strong said Clark's ordination was "a very great victory" for the church because it recognized that "there could be some difference at minor points without a man's loyalty to the system of doctrine being impeached."
In his book, Muether adds in brackets "[of the Westminster Standards]" after "system of doctrine" and makes an interpretive statement of Strong's citation that I don't understand. Muether says, "This was a revealing statement, because Clark himself never conceded that his views required an exception from the church's standards" (pg. 105).
Maybe I'm reading the Strong or Muether horribly wrong, but this doesn't make any sense to me. Strong wasn't saying anything close to the idea that Clark's views required an exception; he was saying the opposite and celebrating that especially on points where the Westminster Standards are silent, "there could be some difference" while yet allowing that both sides are loyal Presbyterians. I have no idea what Muether means by Strong's statement being "revealing" of something. Strong may well have had in mind something like what he helped with as Committee Secretary of The Answer:
The second problem of this section is one of human psychology, and its discussion will again underline the fact that the Complaint is not a matter of the doctrines of the Westminster Confession but of technical and abstruse subtleties more suitable for philosophers than for preachers.
The rest of what Muether says about Strong can be skipped, as can his comments about "whether the church's ecclesiology would be Reformed or evangelical" (pg. 107). There isn't anything Muether says that hasn't already been discussed or accounted for above or in one of the links at the beginning of this post. The next interesting thing Muether says is found on pg. 108:
By the controversy’s end they had persuaded the church that its Reformed militancy needed to express itself in careful distinction from Reformed evangelicalism. It is in this sense that Van Til “won” the debate, and in the larger context of Reformed ecclesiology, Van Til’s role in the Clark controversy, far from being an embarrassment, should be interpreted as one of his finest moments.
Over whom was Van Til victorious? Clark? If that is Muether's implication, he has not nearly established Clark's Reformed views were one rather than the other, as if they can't be both. This was addressed in my last post, and it also applies to Dennison.
Further, on the point of Reformed ecclesiology, there may have been some ecclesiological questions - including whether Westminster Theological Seminary should remain independent, which is not, as far as I can tell, mentioned by Muether - but so far as Clark is strictly concerned, the 1940s debate must remain a strictly theological matter.
There remain only a few matters on which I will comment. Much of Van Til's admiration for Murray, Klooster, and Bavinck as well as Reymond's admiration for Clark can be omitted, but to just point out how easy it is for contemporary theologians to speak in terms which will give a wrong view of those with whom they disagree, take Muether here:
If Clark and Reymond resisted the notions of mystery, Van Til found himself at home with that expression, because of his deeper commitment to revelation and covenant. Van Til was comfortable even to the point of embracing the language of his mentor, Herman Bavinck, that “mystery is the life of all dogmatics.” Because the finite cannot contain the infinite, Bavinck underscored that the revelation of the infinite God to the finite creature cannot be exhaustive of the being of God, and so God remains incomprehensible. (pg. 110)
"Mystery" must mean "paradox." In any case, nothing Bavinck says in the highlighted portion is disagreeable with what Clark argued. Clark didn't argue we exhaust God, so if that were the only question, the whole debate would have been moot. The highlighted portion simply has nothing to do with Clark's concerns, but Muether gives the impression that Van Til was opposed by them on this point.
Speaking of Bavinck, buried in an endnote is a definition of analogical knowledge according to Bavinck, though. On pg. 250, Muether references Bavinck's Reformed Dogmatic, 2:28, which states:
The knowledge we have of God is altogether unique. This knowledge may be called positive insofar as by it we recognize a being infinite and distinct from all finite creatures. On the other hand, it is negative because we cannot ascribe a single predicate to God as we conceive that predicate in relation to creatures. It is therefore an analogical knowledge: a knowledge of a being who is unknowable in himself, yet able to make something of himself known in the being he created. Here, indeed, lies something of an antinomy. Rather, agnosticism, suffering from a confusion of concepts, sees here an irresolvable contradiction in what Christian theology regards as an adorable mystery. It is completely incomprehensible to us how God can reveal himself and to some extent make himself known in created beings: eternity in time, immensity in space, infinity in the finite, immutability in change, being in becoming, the all, as it were, in that which is nothing.
In other words, when we say "God is good" and "man is good," "good" cannot be ascribed to God as it is to creatures. And this goes for every single predicate. So it isn't just that "good" means something different when ascribed to God, it means something totally different. Were this not the case, we could then use a single predicate to meaningfully ascribe similarity regarding what "good" means. This is equivocity, not analogicity.
This criticism will sound familiar to those who have actually read the whole of this long-winded post, for it is yet again the same criticism that "analogical knowledge" is a misnomer as it is applied by Van Til, the other complainants, and, it seems his Dutch forefather.
On another note, Muether says Nash called Clark a "rationalist presuppositionalist" and Van Til a "revelational presuppositionalist" (pg. 113). If there is one persisting complaint I have, it's that Muether does not provide enough sources for his statements. I would have been interested in following up on this, but yet again, I have nothing to go on.
To close with one more engagement with Muether, he criticizes Clark for violating a common classroom illustration by Van Til. Pay attention to the kicker at the end:
The most memorable feature of Van Til’s teaching involved a diagram of the two circles that he drew in his classroom lectures. Van Til positioned the larger one above the smaller one, and the two did not overlap. The former represented God, and the latter the world that he created, which was always dependent upon God and his revelation. The two circles represented not only the creaturely and analogical standing of humanity and God’s transcendence, but as Van Til connected them with two vertical lines, they indicated man’s covenantal standing before God. By connecting creation and covenant in this way, Van Til established the similarity of the being and knowledge of man, as God’s image bearer, with God’s while denying their identity at any point. Gordon Clark, intolerant of any notion of mystery, committed the error of allowing the circles to touch. (pg. 116)
Two last points on this:
1) Muether admits that there must be "similarity of the being and knowledge of man, as God's image bearer, with [God]..." This is an admission which, as I said with Horton, gives the case away. If analogy does indeed involve similarity, it involves overlap. It is unintelligible to compare two subjects, call them similar, and yet have no account for the similarity. On the other hand, any such account will involve univocal predication, for whatever is taken to be the account for the similarity will also be that whereby univocal predication is possible.
Example: is Van Til's account that of "connecting creation and covenant"? If so, then "God is covenanted" and "man is covenanted" mean the same thing. If not, there is no similarity after all, for the meaning is equivocal. We can and should qualify these propositions by adding information - "God is covenanted [in that He is the Suzerain]," "man is covenanted [in that he is the vassal]" (or whatever) - but the content of the additional information will not change the content of the simple, singular predication.
2) Van Til seems to have forgotten what he wrote to Clark in the December 5th, 1938 letter. God must be considered first as apart from creation. Drawing two circles already presupposes two realities. More accurate, I think, would be to make the creation circle dotted rather than solid to indicate its contingency.
Further, on the assumption of creation, these circles are similar insofar as they are circles - why does it matter if they touch? "Similarity" returns us to point 1). It doesn't matter that God needed to breathe "life" ("color" might be apt if Van Til had used a markerboard) into creation. That's the trouble with illustrations, especially in this context: no matter if Van Til were to make different colors, shapes, or drawings, the nature of his attempted illustration itself requires a comparison between two of some same, univocal category (that is, between two colors, shapes, drawings, etc.).
So it is with language, and I would not think Muether has plans to pull up a Wittgensteinian ladder by discarding the very revelation we use to talk about God, nor do I think Van Til would discard the use of "reality" in his "analogization" (let's say) of Creator to creation.
Finally, if the circles are just to illustrate the dependence of creature on God and His revelation, Clark would never have allowed the circles to touch if that mean some part of creation did not stand in such a dependence relation. If Van Til or Muether were to reply that while this may not have been Clark's intent, he nevertheless did so in his refusal to accept man's "analogical standing," these men have much they need to respond to - see this entire post - before that charge can be taken seriously.
Postscript
The nature of the content discussed and resultant disagreement can tend to give an unwanted impression. These men have all labored for the kingdom of God. I appreciate the work they have done and continue to do for my church, for I too attend and love the OPC. I have tried to restrict my comments to the relevant content, so if anything else seems to have bled through the text, it is unintentional.
