History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology

by J. F. Hurst

The Critical School of Theology is beyond all comparison the greatest foe of orthodoxy in France. The English Rationalists exhibit but little scholarly depth, having borrowed their principal thoughts from Germany. The Dutch are too speculative to be successful at present, and the Germans have already grown weary of their long warfare. But the French School, claiming such writers as Scherer, Colani, Pecaut, Réville, Reuss, Coquerel, and Renan, is not to be disregarded, nor are its arguments to be met with indifference. It is, however, most gratifying to state that those ardent friends of the Gospel who resist the attacks of this school manifest a zeal, learning, and skill, quite equal to their ill-armed opponents.

By virtue of that principle of centralization which has long been in force in France, the Critical School of Theology makes Paris the chief seat of its influence. Availing itself of the advantage of the press, it now publishes an organ adapted to every class of readers.[100] The members of the Critical School are connected with the Protestant Church, yet they claim to teach whatever views they may see proper to entertain. They profess deep attachment to the Church, and in their journals advise every one to unite himself with the fold of Christ. If the Reformed Church, in which the most of the Rationalists are found, were not bound to the State by the Concordat and Budget it is probable that it would be divided. One branch would be the Reformed Church of France, founded in 1559, with a clearly determined creed, which none but a General Synod would have power to modify. The other would be the Church of the Future, which would proclaim the admission of no dogmas, no liturgy, and no discipline, and would give power to every one to preach contradictory and negative doctrines in its pulpits.[101]

The association of Rationalists in Paris is called the Liberal Protestant Union. It claims that Protestantism, as represented by the churches, has ceased to be progressive and civilizing. According to its platform, there is no religious authority but free examination; while hostility to all common symbols, and to all profession of faith, is a duty. The Union was immediately opposed. Among other indications of the ill-favor with which it was received was a Remonstrance, signed by some of the most distinguished laymen of Paris. Their language in defense of the Bible as authority for faith was unequivocal. "We do not believe," they said, "that righteousness is indifference; nor do we believe that there is, or can be, a church without a doctrine, a religious doctrine, which unites believers and forms the bond of the Church."

The opinions of the French Critical School of Theology, at which the Remonstrance was aimed, may be briefly stated.

No system is adopted. It professes none, and studiously avoids the embarrassment consequent upon any obligation. Colani says, "We do not present to our readers any fixed system; we have none; we are asking for one conscientiously, patiently; with all our contemporaries, we are in the midst of an epoch of transition. We call around us those who, dissatisfied with the forms of an antiquated system of dogma, and fully admitting salvation by Christ alone, desire to labor in raising the new edifice which is to be built on the solid basis of Him who is at once the son of man and the Son of God.... Not a school, not a system, but a tendency is that which we represent. The device on our banner is 'The True Development of Christian Thought.'"[102] It is difficult to arrive at a knowledge of what this leader is so modest as to call only a "tendency." It claims to have the right of judgment concerning all the truths of the Bible; holds that the Rochelle Confession is a very good monument of the faith of the fathers, but should not now be imposed; that the Bible has no more authority than the books of Plato or Aristotle; that each man has a revelation in himself, free from the imperfections of the Mosaic and Christian revelations; that science, criticism, and examination open the only path to truth; that miracles should be discarded; that Protestantism has lost sight of its mission; and that a second Reformation, embodied in the Church of the Future, is needed to complete the first.[103]

An acknowledged leader of the liberal party has made some statements which more nearly approach the enunciation of a system than we have been able to find in any other authority of French Rationalism.

M. Réville says, "The modern Protestant theology [Rationalism] aspires not to deny the doctrines of the Reformation absolutely, but to preserve the truth that is in them by filtering them through a medium more conformed to our science and our reason. The dogmas of original sin, the trinity, the incarnation, justification by faith, future rewards, and the inspiration of the sacred writings, may serve as examples. On the first of these dogmas, renouncing the idea of an original perfection, the reality of which is contrary to reason, and to all our historical analogies, modern theology would insist on the evil influence which determines to evil an individual plunged in society where sin reigns, on the necessary passage from a state of innocence to a state of moral consciousness and struggle, on the fall which man endures when he sinks from his higher nature to his lower, and renounces God's will to serve his own. As to the trinity, avoiding the scholastic and contradictory tritheism of the old creeds, intent on vigorously preserving God's essential unity, and at the same time his conscious or personal life, this theology attaches itself to the grand idea of the Divine Word pervading the world, as the uttered thought, the objective revelation of God, conceived as manifesting himself to himself in his works. In humanity this eternal word becomes the Holy Spirit, the light which lightens every man coming into the world, but which shines in all its splendor in Jesus Christ. In this series of ideas the incarnation loses that stamp of absolute contradiction which it takes from the orthodox idea of one and the same person, who is at the same time God and man, finite and infinite, localized and omnipresent, praying and prayed to, knowing and not knowing all things, and impeccable, yet tempted. The pure and real humanity of Christ is the basis of the system, and the system may be summed up in these words: The Son of Man is the Son of God. Man is justified by faith, not as the old orthodoxy taught, that is, because he believes that satisfaction was given to God in his place and on his behalf, but because he has confidence in the eternal love of God, and in his own destination for good, as evidenced by Christ in his life and in his death.

"The eternity of future sufferings gives place to an idea more in conformity with sound philosophy, and the revelation of infinite love, according to which, pain resulting from sin, can have for its object only the amelioration of the sinner, and special stress is laid on the spiritual truth that heaven and hell are much less different places than different states of the soul. The inspiration of the Scriptures, that dogma the truth of which consisted in the scriptural value of the Biblical books, as giving a sure basis for faith, as supplying aliment to piety, and elevating the heart, more and more loses its miraculous character to approach analogous phenomena drawn from religions in general, or from other fields where the mind of man reveals itself as inspired. The change of views, however, does not take from the Bible its character as a truly divine book; still does it remain in religion the Book of Books."[104]

It is unsafe to adduce the testimony of any member of this school as an absolute standard of the theological position of all the rest. There is a wide diversity of opinion among them, as any one will perceive who has attempted the comparison. But after examining the individual opinions of some of these men, it will not be difficult to form a correct judgment of their intellectual position as a whole.

One of the most laborious of the number is Edmond Scherer, formerly Professor of Theology in the University of Geneva. His first point of departure from orthodoxy was on the inspiration and authority of the Bible. He became absorbed in German Rationalistic criticism, and adopted its leading principles. His skeptical views caused such offense that he was led to resign his position, when he soon commenced the publication of his views in the new Revue de Théologie at Strasburg. He has subsequently kept aloof from all participation in the State Church and confined himself mostly to writing essays. Some of them have recently been collected into a volume, entitled Miscellanies of Religious Criticism.[105]