**Here’s something I started quite some time ago, I thought I would throw it out here again. For our book, we have 15 Theses for Evangelical Calvinism (that Myk and I co-wrote); and that will more than fill out what I have un-finished here (so you’ll have to wait for the book to come out to get the full meal deal). Nevertheless, I thought I might put this out just for those who are still un-aware of what Evangelical Calvinism is about; and what 
some of the contours of our thought might look like. I’m still somewhat dismayed when I come across blogs and authors who speak as if the only alternative for mediating such things is still that old old binary of classical Calvinism versus Arminianism. Come on now folks, “Evangelical Calvinism” has finally provided the denouement you’ve been looking for. If your mode of theological discourse is more scholastic or you feel the need to live without any tension in your theological “system,” then you will be left unsatisfied with what you find in Evangelical Calvinism; in fact, I fear, that there have been many a wanton PhD student in theology come across the blog here and Evangelical Calvinism, and unfortunately it didn’t fill that hole in their heart that they were hoping it would — it didn’t perform and cohere the way they’ve been conditioned to expect within their prolegomena. Anyway, if you’re actually willing to live with some dialecticism in your theological approach, and you’re tired of that “old time religion” (you know the classic Calvinist/Arminian thing); then welcome to Evangelical Calvinism!
§ God
We hold God to be one and three and three in one, so that His oneness shapes His threeness and His threeness shapes His oneness. This means that God’s life is a plenitude of superabundant love which has always already been the consummate and eternal reality of His life. It is within this dynamic, wherein the Father loves the Son and the Son loves the Father, and the Father and Son love in the communion of the Holy Spirit wherein He freely chose to create a mirror of Himself in His image who might further reflect His love for the other; and in so doing created a community of creatures who find their greatest delight and purpose by loving Him — through Him — and by loving their neighbors.
§ Incarnation
We confess that the second person of the Trinity, the eternal logos — the Son — has eternally been for the other, consonant with this His person (hypostasis) within the Trinitarian life has been proleptically toward Incarnation (yet we also confess that the Incarnation, like Creation, is a novum, or something ‘new’ for God — which is based upon and out of ‘who’ He is without proximation). This presupposes that without sin, without the ‘Fall’, His life has been oriented toward elevating His creation to its consummate and eschatological purpose; which is to participate in the union and knowledge of the Father by the Holy Spirit that He has mutually shared with the Father and Holy Spirit from super-time (or eternity). So we believe that the Incarnation was always the intended event for which the Son has been graciously purposed in His intratrinitarian relation; thus the Incarnation was a truly free and sovereign act decided by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit which is the antecedent to what we see ‘revealed’ in the economy of God’s life in salvation history in Israel and Christ’s life. We believe that the economic revelation of this eternal reality implies — given such realities as the homoousion, hypostatic union — that all of humanity is carnally united to Christ per His ‘supreme’ (“firstborn”) position over all of creation and that some will experience the full implications of the Incarnation which is to participate in the ‘spiritual union’ that the Son vicariously provides for humanity in and through Himself by the Holy Spirit reconciled to the Father in His life.
§ Creation of Man
We believe that man was originally created in the imago dei (Image of God), which is to say that given the eschatological shape of God’s life in Christ by the Holy Spirit; we believe that man was proleptically created in the imago Christi (Image of Christ) who in fact has always already been the icon or image of God. Man was created for the purpose of spreading God’s goodness and glory by koinonial love with and through God, and thus by communanly loving his neighbor.
§ The ‘Fall’
Unfortunately man ‘fell’ into sin by believing the ‘word’ of the serpent, instead of believing the Word of God. This act separated man from God’s life and introduced an soloptic autonomy into man’s state, so that what once was an unbroken disposition of receiving life from God as ‘gift’ and love, an outward and upward position of doxology; has now become an inward curvature of self-love (concupiscence) wherein man’s life is shaped by holding onto what he perceives to be his — ‘his life as god’ — and for which he will make the ultimate sacrifice which is to give himself as a ransom for himself in order to maintain his position as god — he can do no other, for this is what he is by sinful nature.
§ Election and Reprobation
We believe in a Christ conditioned supralapsarianism. Which is to say that we believe that Christ is the electing God and the elected God who freely elected our reprobation for Himself (our poverty), and His election as the Son (by adoption) for us. We do not believe that this election is constitutive of His life, but instead that it reflects the eternal shape of God’s superabundant life of love in action. So God’s being shapes His action, and His action shapes His being; so that what we see in the economy of election in Christ is what has always already been the reality of God’s life. We believe that the Holy Spirit brings the ‘elect’ into consummate or full election which is to participate in Christ’s life as the elected of the Father. We do not pretend to explain why the reprobate reject the life and gift of Christ which they have been carnally united to; only that this rejection of life in Christ now serves as the ground for their judgment.
§ At-onement
§ Christ’s Death, Burial, and Resurrection
§ The Ascension
§ Faith and Good Works
. . .
Bobby,
For me anyway, the Fall must be classical supralapsarian or infralapsarian. Without this, God’s sovereignty seems called into question, or not really real! It is this that keeps me a somewhat classic Calvinist and too Augustinian. 🙂
What is the true definition of soveREIGN? And from whence cometh it?
Certainly we all agree that our God reigns, to the nth degree beyond the reign of David, who was sovereign over his kingdom. What is that nth degree?
An acquaintance once argued that if I were to intentionally step in front of a speeding truck and end my life, it would have been God’s sovereign will that ultimately caused that. If not, then God is not sovereign. I believe that usage to be dead wrong.
Westminster builds it’s case on the “sovereignty of God”. What is “sovereignty” to God?
What does Westminster say? What does EC say?
Duane,
This is again the real issue for me, i.e. the Doctrine of God! And I just see the WS closer to the biblical reality of the Sovereignty of God! Btw, note my favorite Creed: The Irish Articles 1615, and Ussher etc. Though I don’t follow the western Filioque myself.
Bobby and I are friends certainly, but I just cannot connect with the EC on the main theological doctrine of God! And me we keep this debate theological and friendly! 🙂 Note too I am somewhat drawn to the FV.
*may
@Fr Robert,
EC would be supra, but Christ-conditioned of course. Meaning that all of this predestination/election refers to the inner-life of God and His election to be reprobate for us (take fallen humanity for Himself — the “Great Exchange”) pre-temporal.
@Duane,
W/o getting into the details: EC sees God’s sovereignty shaped by who He is in His inter-triune relations; so love. Classic defines God from His works as Creator, then reads that back into the shape of His triune relations; love, mercy, grace, power, all of the common attributes are defined by God as brute powerful Creator. That’s the primary difference oversimplified and in a nutshell. Your friend obviously, wrongly, followed the latter approach; which has led to extreme expressions of that known as meticulous providence (so that there is a logico-deductive-causal schema mediating upon how we conceive of God relating to His creation as brute Creator vs. the “EC” approach which thinks of God’s relation to Creation by first looking at the relations that inhere between the Son, the Father, and the Holy Spirit . . . it doesn’t have this kind of causal rationalism shaping the way we interpret God’s sovereignty in this regard, then).
@Fr Robert,
And I agree, I don’t follow the filioque either.
@Bobby: The EC seems to ellipse God the Creator, i.e. Elohim. Before we can get to the covenant relation (Yah or Jehovah), we must have the God the Creator/Elohim!
Fr Robert,
You’re certainly right in noticing a methodological move, but it’s no different than the move that the Nicene-Constant. Councils made in their deliberations; it’s “Christian.” Somewhat like our brother Irenaeus and his recapitulation model. So it depends on whether we’re going to follow a strict “Progressive Revelation” model, or if we’re going to read salvation history through the lens provided by God’s self-revelation in Christ (you know that this is the way that Athanasius, Epiphanius et al went about this . . . this is where I see a bit of conflict in your approach: i.e. your attempt to hold onto both a more scholastic mode along with an affirmation of the mode that the ‘Fathers’, I just mentioned, used).
So we don’t ellipse God the Creator, but we understand who this God is as triune and Father of the Son before we can truly appreciate Him as the Creator. So of course my point is, is that our approach is rooted in soteriology then epistemology; not epistemology then soteriology . . . you know the routine 😉 .
Bobby,
Yeah, I am an eclectic.. 😉 and btw, I was drawn to Neo-Orthodox for awhile (years back), with both Brunner and Buber. I still like some of their material. Did you know that the Jewish and Hasidic Martin Buber had a certain effect on Brunner? True, his I/thou stuff, etc. Bunner wrote three books from the affect of Buber: The Divine-Human Encounter (1937) ; Main In Revolt (1938) ; and also Revelation and Reason (1941).
Btw, Bobby, have you ever read any of Van Til’s Trinitarian thoughts? Just good stuff there to me!
*Man in Revolt … man me type is getting off, I am gett’in old I guess? lol
Bobby,
I am certainly “epistemological” first. As are most all the Reformers I might add! This is really central for me. Yes our method in the biblical approach is almost everything! I am just a convinced Augustinian, with some eclecticism. 🙂 But, I try to have an open mind. 🙂
Fr Robert,
Yes, I was aware of the impact that Buber’s I/Thou dialectic had upon many folks; including Brunner.
Of course I recall, I think around Christmas, your pull back towards “Eastern Orthodoxy,” and the whole theotokos discussion we were having; you were quite un-scholastic in that season 😉 .
Bobby,
Yeah I have had the high/low church struggle off and on at times for over the years, I hope however that the Word of God has taken hold in that final place of authority. I had this years ago with my greatgram and ‘The Brethren’ group, I was a young teen. I can say that I had experienced the New Birth then, but I went back to Catholicism later, and then Augustine too. As you can see, that aspect still has great influence on me also, not so much R.C., but the aspect of the Fathers. For example, my favorite early Father is Tertullian! He really is my man in so many ways! But really Tertullian leads me toward the Bible, and Christ alone also. Of course as the final and only authority. But to get there we must also “think” and “reason”! 🙂
Fr Robert,
I know knowing God is messy, and that there are many variables involved in each one of our personal spiritual formations. I just think you should convert to “EC”, that way you could have eclecticism built into your theological method instead of maintaining one that won’t allow for it 😉 . . . i.e. scholasticism.
Bobby,
Scholasticism, especially Reformed really does allow for some aspect of eclectic movement, note the unio mystica, unio personalis, and unio spiritualis, etc. Even the unio sacramentalis, indeed lots of biblical mystery: unio cum Christo.. Union with Christ!
Reformed Anglicanism is a thing of beauty really, the Reformed scholasticism assumes a biblical basis for the entire “ordo”. But the “ordo” is also determinative together with the concept of an economy (oeconomia) or dispensation of grace. And really here is the whole praedestinatio Christi! Once again, we need our whole epistemology (episteme), and sapientia scientia! 🙂
Note, I love Latin, and the Latin Father Tertullian! It is interesting that Jerome called Tertullian as a “learned and zealous writer”, he was always the student.. but spiritually so also (Montanism), later in his life. I love his work: Against Praxeas, a Trinitarian apology.
Bobby,
Btw, concerning method and the methodological, the RCC for example uses both the scholastic method and the salvation history model. It is not an either or. Nor did the Reformation and Reform Churches.
A good discussion gentlemen, thank you.
I had to look up filioque. Yes, “our” Lutheran Church uses the filioque in the Nicene Creed. I suppose it is too much to presume, to add it into the creed after the fact, and not so much Biblical evidence to substantiate it.
This is plausibly my bias, but I’m thinking if one is to try to “see” God, on things not explained explicitly in Scripture, I would think His ontology would hold primacy over His first recorded act. After all, His ontology is eternal, while his creation has a beginning.
So, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”, vs “In the the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men….”
As a matter of fact “no man has seen God at any time. The Only Begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.”
Now a days, a phrase like that, “in the bosom of the Father” sounds much less nuts and boltsy to me- “the wrist bone connected to the shoulder bone”, and much more “in the heart of the Father” kind of message. 🙂
Bobby,
So the EC is Barthian and Torrancian, but both are rather new, and so how do you really connect the classic Reformation here? Which is both Aristotelian and Augustinian, and certainly Scholastic! 🙂
And btw, my use of the Latin terms came from Muller’s classic Protestant Scholatic Dictionary (Of Latin and Greek Theological Terms). Both Reformed and Reformational.
Fr Robert,
Yes, but there is a specific kind of scholasticism that I’m referring to; i.e. “Scholasticism Reformed.” And within those strictures the unio mystica etc take on certain emphases that I do not believe Calvin’s own understanding of that ever envisioned (just recall Canlis’ book “Calvin’s Ladder”).
And you’re simply wrong to insist that the “classic” Reformation only reflects the scholastics. Of note is the Scottish Theology from whence Evangelical Calvinism finds her moorings (also the Marrow men). And then as I’ve noted before Janice Knight has demonstrated a distinction amongst English Calvinism/Puritanism what she labels “The Spiritual Brethren” vs. “The Intellectual Fathers;” the latter being scholastic and Federal, the former being non-scholastic and non-Federal (also in England, more popular and even “orthodox” for a time). I don’t think it does anyone any good to deny all the various strands within the Calvinist/Reformed heritage; Evangelical Calvinism is representative of one of those strands (not all EC guys contributing to the book are Torrancean or Barthian, they are simply Calvinian or “EC” like: Charles Partee, Andrew Purves, Marcus Johnson, Julie Canlis, Gannon Murphy, et al).
And yeah, I have Muller’s Prot./Schol. Dictionary; it serves its purpose.
@Duane,
Yes, I think the simpler the better (Occam’s razor). We don’t want to go beyond Scripture, we want to explicate it in ways that honors it as Christ’s Church!
Bobby,
Of course the Marrow Men, and the Scots have been answered by Federal Calvinisim. One should see their work and answers back, etc.
Fr Robert,
Sure, but that’s not my point; my point is that within the stream of so called Calvinism, there are many strands. To me it is ad hoc to lift up one strand over against another by merely appearing to the history; we need to make those judgements by the Scripture.
Bobby,
I would disagree, Calvinism is always historical, but certainly seeking to find the most biblical strand is certainly important. Note early to English Calvinism moved almost at every strata of the Protestant Church. Also the French Calvinists, Holland, etc. Of course today, Calvinism is not as prominent in Europe, nor England. Btw, I guess you don’t like Van Til’s Trinitarianism?
I haven’t read Van Til’s Trinitarianism yet. I never said Calvinism wasn’t historical, just the opposite. What I said was that not all strands of historical Calvinism took shape under Aristotelian constraints.
Bobby,
My point has always been, that the Reformation and the Reformers were Aristotelian and Augustinian! The Reformers were seeking to reform R. Catholicism. At least this was the beginning idea.
Fr Robert,
Well my counter-point is that part of that initial Reformation was to undercut the Aristotelian framework; just see Luther’s Disputation Against The Scholastics. I follow the thesis of my former prof, Dr Ron Frost, that the Reformation was actually still-birthed once scholasticism (Aristotelian) was re-injected into the Protestant Reformation through the scholastics. Frost had an exchange with Richard Muller in the Trinity Journal back in 1996 and 1997 over this very issue.
Bobby,
Indeed Luther’s idea of calling ‘Scholasticism’ the Great Whore is of course famous. But he was speaking more so of Catholicism certainly, and their method. He, as Melanchton could not really escape either the Aristotelian logic, and Augustinism. And of course Calvin was here also. Here we can see a new wave of Platonist influence (Augustinian and Neo-Platonic) against late mediaeval Aristotelianism. And we cannot forget the humanist Aristotelianism which persisted throught the Renaissance, and was more congential to scholasticism, etc. And we cannot forget Erasmus here either. So in reality the end of the 16th century witnessed a renewal or renewed Protestant scholasticism side by side with a renewal of Catholic philosophy. And any examination of Luther’s theology would certainly include both Aristotelian and Augustinian, logic and philosophy. Note the new Finnish approach to Luther, etc.
Fr Robert,
Melanchthon could not escape it in the end, but I wouldn’t paint Luther with that brush! The irony is that what Luther protested the Prot. scholastics re-inserted themselves right back into the Aristotelian mix (conceptually) that Luther Protested (and Calvin). There’s no doubt that Luther and Calvin, at points, appealed to Aristotelian rhetoric, but not the substance. Even the Finnish interp on Luther supports his disgust with the conceptual that Aristotle and Thomas supported.
There’s much more to Augustine than you seem to let onto, Fr Robert. I know of research that provides a radically different view of Augustine than his Thomistic gloss would allow for. And it can be argued that both Luther and Calvin appealed to this Augustine and not the Thomistic Augustine (who in fact they protested). There’s much too much to this to argue here. That’s all I can say on it for now.
Bobby,
I am not seeking to make either Luther or Calvin strict Thomists, that would not be true, but of course they were both Aristotelian and Augustinian, quite simply. It is here too that most of the Reformation went. Note Luther, as too Zwingli, believed in some aspect to God’s reprobation. As too btw, many of the Roman Catholics theolog’s.
Fr Robert,
We would have to define what we mean by Luther and Calvin being Aristotelian a bit further in order for me to be happy 🙂 . There’s no doubt, as I said, that both continued to use the grammar of Aristotle at points; but that’s not to say that this also shaped their theology as it did for the Reformed scholastics. But to be clear, I’m not trying to make them “EC” either.
Bobby,
I would maintain myself, that both Aristotelian and Augustinian thought shaped both Luther and Calvin’s doctrine. At least in it’s historic form at the time. Of course both sought to shape their doctrine and theology by the Word of God foremost. But both were “epistemological” first, and formed their doctrine of God from this standpoint of the Text. And perhaps both were supralapsarian? But at least inralapsarian, or sub.
Heiko Oberman provides good context and background for Luther, Calvin and the whole period leading up to the Prot. Reformation in his Harvest of Medieval Theology, The: Gabriel Biel and Late Medieval Nominalism; which I need to re-read (I’ve only actually read sections of it in the past for some research purposes).
Oberman is always a good read!