Ought the confession of faith to be revised?

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

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Contents

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I. — Letter of Dr. De Witt (New York Evangelist,

II. — Kesponse of Dr. Van Dyke (New York Evangelist, June 27, 1889), 9

II

KESPONSE OF DK. VAN DYKE.

The revision of our Confession of Faith does not appear to me such a formidable task as Dr. De Witt apprehends. This is due doubtless to our different understanding of the thing proposed. He says, " It is easy enough to criticise the language of the Westminster Divines ; but it is not so easy to write formulas on the same subjects which will command as general an assent throughout the Church." For one I do not believe that either the science of theology and Scripture exegesis, or the art of expressing divine truth in acceptable words, has so far declined in the Presbyterian Church that it would be impossible to rewrite the whole or any part of the Westminster Confession. If it were so, it would be a sad result of these two hundred years of Biblical study and theological training. But it is not necessary to discuss this question. So far as I know, nobody proposes to make a new Confession, nor to rewrite the old one, nor even to make an entire new statement of any doctrine belonging to the system which it contains. It is not a reconstruction, but a revision, which is proposed. To revise, according to Worcester, is " to look over with a view to correct or amend." After studying the Confession for nearly half a century, and adhering to it to-day with as much loyalty as any man ought to feel toward any uninspired statement of divine truth, I am in favor of the proposed revision. Without admitting the canon that no one ought to criticise a human production unless he is able to make a better one, or that no Presbyterian minister

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should express his desire to have the Confession revised unless he is able to revise it himself, I am ready at the first call of the trumpet to answer Dr. De Witt's challenge to give to every one in favor of the revision " samples of the new or revised statements," and to " try his hand at a formula correlated to the formulas he does not want revised/'

Let us begin with Chapter III., Of God's eternal decree. The first and second sections contain all that is essential to the doctrine, admirably sums up the teaching of Scripture on the subject, and guards it against the abominable inference that God is the author of sin, or that any violence is offered to the will of the creature. But the third section has a supralapsarian bias. It may be construed to mean that men are foreordained, whether to life or death, simply as men, and not as fallen men ; in other words, that God makes one on purpose to save him, and another on purpose to damn him. I would like to see that section amended, and brought into "correlation" with the teaching of the most orthodox theologians of our time, by inserting the words for their sins, so that it would read, " By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels are predestinated unto everlasting life, and others foreordained for their sins to everlasting death." The fourth section I would like to see stricken out. Because it states a mere theological inference not in any way necessary to the exposition of the doctrine, and especially because it goes beyond the statements of the Scripture on the subject. There is no appropriate proof-text for it. The two that are quoted are wide of the mark. The declaration of Paul, "The Lord knoweth them that are His" (2 Tim. ii. 19), and the saying of Christ, " I know whom I have chosen," were not intended to show that the number of those predestinated, whether to life or to death, " cannot be either increased or diminished," neither do they prove it ;

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nor is it necessary to prove it. The seventh section of the same chapter contains another theological inference, which, however logical, is not necessary, to a positive and complete statement of the Scripture truth. The word pretention, or reprobation, is not used in our Confession, but the doctrine covered by these terms is taught in this section. Some of our ablest and most orthodox ministers openly reject it, and it is a stumbling-block to many. If any one says their rejection of this section, while they accept the rest of the chapter, proves that they are not strictly orthodox, and that the statement ought to be retained as a test between the Calvinistic and the Calvinist : I have only to say that as a Calvinist I have no sympathy with such intolerance and want of tenderness for others.

But the striking out of this section would not satisfy me. I would like to see its place supplied with something which would amend what many of our best divines regard as a serious defect in our Confession taken as a whole, namely : that it contains no explicit declaration of the infinite love of God, revealed in the fullness of the Gospel salvation as sufficient for, adapted to, and freely offered to all men. And here I am willing to " try my hand at a formula correlated to the formulas which I do not want revised," and to submit it to the criticism of all the orthodox. Let the seventh section read thus : " God's eternal decree hindereth no one from accepting Christ as He is freely offered to us in the Gospel ; nor ought it to be so construed as to contradict the declarations of Scripture, that Christ is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world, and that God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." Will any Presbyterian minister dare to say that such a formula as this would not correlate with the rest of our Confession, or that it would introduce a discordant element into the chapter on the divine decrees?

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That is precisely the position of Arminians and all other opponents of the Calvinistic system ; and one who objects to such an amendment plays into their hands. I contend that this amendment, or one expressing the same thoughts in better language, would be in perfect harmony with the whole Confession, and that it would add logical force as well as divine beauty to the concluding section of the chapter about handling the doctrine of this high mystery of predestination with special prudence and care, so that it may afford matter of praise to God and abundant consolation to all who obey the G-ospel.

The tenth chapter of the Confession contains the well-known phrase, " elect infants dying in infancy." I will not enter upon the discussion as to the historic meaning of that much-jaculated phrase, nor review the explanations by which we answer the interpretations of our enemies, nor answer for the thousandth time the old slander that Calvin taught that hell is paved with infants' skulls. We have fenced and fought and played football with the phrase long enough. If the Westminster Assembly adopted it as a compromise, let us no longer perpetuate their ambiguity. If it means that all dying infants are elect, let us say so in the Confession itself, in words that will leave no room for controversy. If it means that the whole subject is in doubt, and that for aught we know some dying infants may be lost, let us reject a doctrine which no Presbyterian minister holds, or would dare to preach if he did. I believe with Dr. Hodge, that all infants dying in infancy, baptized and unbaptized, born in Christian or in heathen lands, are elect and saved. (See Hodge's " Theology," vol. i., p. 29.) And therefore I am in favor of amending the Confession at this point by striking out the word elect, and substituting the word all, so that the section would read thus : " All infants dying in infancy are regenerated and saved by

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Christ through the Spirit, who worketh when and where and how He pleaseth. So also are all other elect persons who are incapable of being outwardly called by the ministry of the Word."

These are not all the amendments which I would like to have made, but they may serve for the required samples. They are offered without consultation with any one. They are my personal convictions after many years of study. They do not indicate any defection from our Standards, but a profound love and loyalty which would vindicate them from reproach, and lift them higher in the estimation of men. In this respect I claim to be in the first rank of the orthodox. But the Confession is not the Bible. Its authors were not inspired, nor is their work immaculate. As to the sentiment — for it can hardly be called an opinion without disrespect — that this human and fallible exposition of the Scriptures, after two hundred years of improved Christian scholarship, cannot be amended for the better, nothing but personal regard for those who entertain it restrains our laughter.

Henry J. Van Dyke.

Brooklyn, June 22, 1889.

III

DR. DE WITT'S RESPONSE TO DR. YAN DYKE.

I saw only yesterday Dr. Yan Dyke's response to my letter on Confessional Revision. I was delighted to find not only that my letter had attracted the attention of so eminent a minister, but also that the suggestion it contained had received from him the most emphatic endorsement he could give to it, namely, the endorsement involved in its adoption. Some of your readers may remember that I called attention to the ease with which the Confession can be criticised, and contrasted this ease with the difficulty of formulating confessional statements which will command an assent as general as that now commanded by the Confession of Faith. I suggested that those who desire amendments, present their amendments in positive form, correlating them to the statements of the Confession which they do not wish amended.

This Dr. Yan Dyke has done. He has formulated two amendments. He has brought to their preparation exceptionally vigorous and well-trained mental powers, wide and accurate theological knowledge, and, above all, the accumulated results of " a study of the Confession for half a century by one who loyally adheres to it." The proposals of such a man must be read with deep interest by a large number of clergymen ; and the fact that they are put forward by him, is itself likely to secure for them a favorable consideration. I am happy in the thought that I called him out, and I am especially interested in the proposals he (14)

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has made, because they finely illustrate the difficulty I mentioned in my letter — the difficulty, I mean, of preparing satisfactory confessional formulas. That I may be clearly understood, I undertake to show that one, at least, if not both, of Dr. Yan Dyke's proposed amendments, will, if adopted, make our Confession of Faith a narrower or less liberal symbol than it is at present.

The third section of the tenth chapter commences with the often-repeated sentence, "Elect infants dying in infancy are regenerated and saved by Christ through the Spirit, who worketh when and where and how He pleaseth." This, Dr. Yan Dyke proposes to amend by striking out the word "Elect" and by inserting in its place the word "All." He says that he "will not enter upon the discussion of the historic meaning of the statement," and for that reason I refrain from doing so, although a discussion of its history, so far as that can be ascertained, would, in my judgment, bring into clear light the wisdom and the catholicity of the Assembly of Divines. Especially would it show how important in their view is the distinction between a dogma of the faith, on the one hand, and a private opinion on the other, — a distinction which ought never to be lost sight of by any who undertake to frame a statement intended to bind the conscience of a Church.

But without going into the history of the sentence, it is clear that it permits, as it was intended to permit, a presbyter to hold and to teach any one of the four following opinions : First, all infants dying in infancy are saved ; second, some infants dying in infancy are not saved ; third, though it is impossible to 'be certain, yet there is a well-grounded hope that all who die in infancy are saved ; fourth, though certainty is impossible, there are considerations that awaken the fear that God has not chosen to regenerate all infants dying in infancy. Thus the Westminster divines left the

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whole subject to individual opinion, and made places under the Confession — as our fathers, by adopting their work, made places in the Church — for men of widely differing views.

Dr. Yan Dyke now proposes to define as a doctrine what has hitherto been left to private opinion. He will permit no opinion except the opinion, " All infants dying in infancy are saved." Henceforth, should his proposal be adopted, doubt or hesitancy in respect to the future salvation of all infants dying in infancy will have no more legal right in the breast of a Presbyterian minister than doubt in respect either to the existence of a personal God or to the reality of the Atonement of Christ. Should a minister make so cautious and conservative a statement as that made by the late Prof. Henry E. Smith, " As to those who die in infancy, there is a well-grounded hope that they are of the elect " (" Christian Theology," p. 322), it would be competent for a Presbytery to deal with him just as it would deal with a minister who should say, " As to a personal God, there is a well-grounded hope that He will be found to exist." I say, therefore, that Dr. Yan Dyke's proposal on this subject is a proposal to narrow the Church — to make it less liberal than it is to-day, by lifting out of the realm of opinion, and into the realm of officially defined dogma, a subject concerning which we are now at liberty to reach individual conclusions.

Moreover, if Dr. Yan Dyke should get his amendment passed, he would be in no better position as a religious teacher, so far as this subject is concerned, than he is now. He could not announce in the pulpit any more positively than he is now permitted to do, that " all who die in infancy are saved." The sum total of his gain would be the imposition on the whole Church, as a defined dogma, of what is now a private belief. The only result would be to

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make the theological platform of the Church less liberal than it now is.

I have no right to ask for space in order to criticise at length Dr. Van Dyke's proposed amendments of the chapter on the decree of God. Indeed, writing at a distance from my books, I hesitate to say anything. I will say, however, that one of them is open to the same objection that I offer to his proposal concerning the " infants dying in infancy." He objects to the present form of the third section, because it has "a supralapsarian bias." He will not say that a sublapsarian Calvinist cannot accept it. That the sublapsarian can do. But the difficulty is that a supralapsarian Calvinist can accept it also. The effect of his amendment would not be to make it easier for sublapsarian Calvinists to subscribe the declaration, for that is perfectly easy now. It would only be, if it had any effect of the kind, to make it more difficult for supralapsarians to subscribe it. At any rate, Dr. Van Dyke's avowed object is to get rid of supralapsarianism. Now I think it one of the glories of this Confession, that its authors were unwilling to drive out of the synagogue those who held either historical form of Calvinism. And though I am no more a supralapsarian than Dr. Yan Dyke is, Beza, Gomarus, Yan Mastricht, and Twisse, the Prolocutor of the Westminster Assembly, were, unless my memory is at fault. And when I read the Institutes of Calvin, I am unable to find anything that shows clearly that he was not. Certainly, I shall not vote for an amendment intended or calculated to make the platform of the Church too narrow for these men to stand on.

I have, I think, maintained the proposition with which I began, namely, that Dr. Yan Dyke's amendments, if adopted, will make the Confession of our Church less liberal than it is. This, I undertake to say, will be the effect of most of the amendments that shall be proposed, unless great care is

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taken. The "Westminster divines were an exceptionally wise body of men. The wisdom of the Assembly was far greater than the wisdom of its wisest member. I have not studied the Confession for half a century, as Dr. Yan Dyke has done. Still I have studied it, and I profoundly admire the learning and the wisdom its authors displayed, not only in what they defined, but also, and I may say especially, in what they might have been expected to define, and yet refrained from defining. The result of their labors is, that the Confession, when subscribed as we subscribe it in our Church, gives to a ministry the largest liberty possible within the limits of the Calvinistic or Reformed theology. My own impression is, that we would better let it stand as it is. I say this, remembering that it is not impossible that an amendment may be proposed which will really improve it. I hazard nothing, however, in asserting that attempts to improve it, while keeping it Calvinistic, are usually attempts to narrow it by imposing passing individual opinions on the conscience of the whole Church.

Of course the Presbyterian Church may some day desire to relegate all that is distinctively Calvinistic in its creed to the realm of private opinion ; and in the interest of Church unity, to stand on some such doctrinal platform as that of the American Tract Society or the Evangelical Alliance. The Congregationalists of some parts of the country have done this substantially, but the result up to this time does not encourage the hope that such a change of doctrinal platform will promote belief in the distinctive doctrines of Christianity.

But this is a large subject, and the excision of Calvinism from the Confession is not the subject now before the Church.

John De Witt.

IV

! DR. VAN DYKE'S REJOINDER. TO DR.

DE WITT.

Dr. De Witt's article in the Evangelist of July 11th, is so full of respectful kindness that it seems like ingratitude to make any response beyond my thanks for his courtesy. But the subject under discussion is so far above personal considerations, that I am sure my generous friend will not be offended by my observing that he is too hasty in claiming the victory. Let not him that putteth on his armor, boast as he that putteth it off. He has not proved the sweeping assertion " that attempts to improve the Confession, while keeping it Calvinistic, are usually attempts to narrow it by imposing passing individual opinions on the conscience of the whole Church"; nor has he shown that all or any of the amendments I proposed are " rMvate opinions," which, if adopted, " would make our Confession less liberal than it is." It is not clear to my mind with what precise meaning Dr. De Witt uses the phrase "private opinion." In his article it seems — unintentionally, of course — to "palter in a double sense." When he says, "Of course the Presbyterian Church may desire some day to relegate all that is distinctively Calvinistic in its creed, to the realm of private opinion," the word private appears to be synonymous with unauthorized — not recognized in the Standards. But this cannot be his meaning, when he applies the same epithet to my proposed amendments: for they are confessedly unauthorized, and because they are not in the Confession already, we desire to put them into it.

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By " private opinion " he must mean an opinion held by very few, not generally adopted, or as he himself explains it, " a passing individual opinion." In response to his summons, I proposed five distinct amendments. Has he proved that any one of them is a passing individual opinion ? I think not. Three of them he does not notice at all, viz. : the proposals to strike out the fourth and seventh sections of the third chapter, and especially the new section which I offered as a substitute for the seventh, in these words : " God's eternal decree hindereth no one from accepting Christ as He is freely offered to us in the Gospel ; nor ought it to be so construed as to contradict the declarations of Scripture that Christ is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world, and that God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." This is the only instance in which I undertook, in answer to Dr. De Witt's challenge, to formulate a statement " correlated to the formulas which he does not want revised." But the challenger takes no notice of it whatever. Does he brand this simple statement of the fullness and freeness of the Gospel as a passing individual opinion which ought not to be " imposed upon the conscience of the Church " ? Or are we permitted to conclude that his silence gives consent ?

Of the two remaining amendments, the first has for its avowed object, as Dr. De Witt correctly says, to get rid of the supralapsarian Mas from Section 3, Chapter III., by making it read that God foreordains men to everlasting death, not merely for His own glory, but also for their sins. Dr. De Witt does not deny that as it now stands, it has a supralapsarian bias ; but he defends and desires to retain the present form of the statement. He says that it is perfectly easy for the sublapsarian to subscribe to it, and intimates that I will not say to the contrary. But that is just what I do say. It is a stumbling-block and an offence.

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If it was designed to embrace both the supralapsarian and the sublapsarian form of Calvinism, it failed in its object ; for it leans distinctly toward the theory that God foreordains men to eternal death simply as creatures, antecedent to and irrespective of their sins. For one, I do not believe this ; neither do I subscribe to it. I receive and adopt the Confession as a whole, in spite of this statement. Ninetynine hundredths of our Presbyterian ministers do the same.

But Dr. De Witt is troubled about the efiect of the proposed amendment upon the standing of the dead. He tells us that Gomarus, Yan Maestrict, and Twisse, and even Calvin, were supralapsarians, and he will not " vote for an amendment which would make the platform of the Church too narrow for these men to stand on." Admitting, for the sake of the argument (though I deny it in fact, so far as regards Calvin), that these men all held the supralapsarian theory, what then ? None of them but Twisse ever adopted our Confession ; and now they are all in heaven, where they are not required to do so. Our fellowship with the saints in glory does not rest upon our Confession of Faith. We propose to amend our Standard with a view to its adaptation to the living, not to the dead. How many among the recognized teachers of theology in the American Presbyterian Church have held the supralapsarian theory ? Not one. Woods, Richards, Henry B. Smith, the Hodges, Thornwell, Shedd— all repudiate it. How many of our living ministry believe or preach it? Does Dr. De Witt know of any whose conscience would be imposed upon by the adoption of my sublapsarian amendment? If there were space for such discussion, I could easily show that the doctrine of this amendment, so far from being " a passing individual opinion," belongs to the very substance and consensus of the Reformed theology ; that the contrary opinion

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belongs not to the sixteenth, but to the seventeenth century ; that its seed was sown, not by such as Beza and Calvin, but by men like Twisse ; and that its fruit is seen in that hideous Emmonsism from which the New Theology of New England is largely the natural and necessary revolt. Dr. A. A. Hodge, in his " Consensus of the Eeformed Confessions," says : " It is no part of the Eeformed faith that God created men in order to damn them ; nor that His treatment of the lost is to be referred to His sovereign will. He condemns men only as a Judge for their sins, to the praise of His glorious justice" (Presbyterian Review, vol. v., p. 295). Even if there were many men in our Church to-day to agree with Twisse, the practical question would be whether they should tolerate us, or we tolerate them. I think the exercise of toleration is the privilege of an overwhelming majority.

The same course of argument applies equally well to the proposed amendment in regard to the salvation of infants. The phrase " elect infants," if it was intended to embrace all opinions on the subject prevalent in the Westminster Assembly at the time of its adoption, has practically failed in our day to accomplish its object. It is quoted and understood by thousands within and without the Presbyterian Church, not only as tolerating, but as teaching by implication that some dying infants are lost, in fulfilment of a supralapsarian decree. But where is the man or woman in our Church who believes this % Dr. Hodge says, " It is the genera] belief of Protestants, contrary to the doctrine of Eomanists and Eomanizers, that all who die in infancy are saved" (see "Theology," vol. i., p. 27). He also declares that he never saw a Calvinistic theologian who doubted it. Dr. Thomas Smyth, whose ministry covered the greater part of the first half of this century, in his book on the "Salvation of Infants," published in 1848, says:

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" At this time it is, I suppose, universally believed by Presbyterians and those who hold the doctrine of election, that all dying infants are included among the elect. I at least am not acquainted with any who hold an opposite opinion." There is a great cloud of witnesses whose testimony is to the same effect.

But in face of all their testimony, Dr. De Witt says the belief that all infants dying in infancy are saved, is a mere private opinion — a passing individual opinion — and that its adoption into the Confession would be an imposition upon the conscience of the whole Church. Nay, he thinks the adoption of such an amendment would not only narrow our Confession, but might stir up the tires of bigotry and persecution. Surely our good brother is tilting at a shadow when he says, " Dr. Yan Dyke will permit no opinion, except the opinion that ' all infants dying in infancy are saved.' Henceforth, should his proposal be adopted, doubt or hesitancy in respect to the salvation of all dying infants will have no more legal right in the breast of a Presbyterian minister, than doubt as to the existence of a personal God, or the reality of the atonement of Christ. Should a minister make such a cautious and conservative statement as that made by the late Prof. H. B. Smith — 6 As to those who die in infancy, there is a well-grounded hope that they are of the elect ' — it would be competent for a Presbytery to deal with him, just as it would deal with a minister who should say, 6 As to a personal God, there is a well-grounded hope that He will be found to exist.' " This is a reductio ad ahsurdum, but it is not on my side. No one proposes to make the salvation of infants as important a doctrine as the existence of God. I am not so sure as Dr. De Witt seems to be, that a well-grounded hope in regard to either, is not quite as good as an assured belief. I do not think any Presbytery would convict a man of heresy for making either

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statement. There is, however, this difference between the two subjects : the existence of God is a matter of consciousness as well as of testimony, whereas the salvation of infants rests only on the testimony of God's Word. If a man believes that his hope of their salvation is well grounded in that testimony, I think his faith is about as strong relatively to its subject, as when he says, I believe and know there is a personal God.

If both these amendments were adopted, the supralapsarian and the doubter in regard to infant salvation, if such there are, would have no more difficulty in adopting the Confession, than the great mass of our ministers have now. JSo one would be put out of the synagogue, while many would be encouraged to come in. And above all, the whole Church would have the immense public advantage of conforming her Confession to her faith. A dead law on the statute-book impairs the authority of all law. A doctrinal statement in our Confession, which the mass of our ministers and people do not believe, opens the door for unbounded license in subscribing to our Standards. For this very reason some are opposed to revision. But Dr. De Witt is not one of them • and I am not without hopes that he, with bis inherited zeal for the Presbyterian Church, and his broad scholarly attainments, will yet be found among the advocates of a conservative revision.