Vanhoozer defends “classical theism” from those who believe that Hellenistic philosophy and Greek metaphysics have distorted this brand of theology. According to Vanhoozer the critics of classical theism state that,
“…classical theism is no innocent conceptual scheme, but a Procrustean bed that short sheets the biblical testimony, making it difficult in the extreme to do justice to the notion of a loving personal God who enters into reciprocal relations with his finite, fragile human creatures…That the God of classical theism is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob but the God of Greek metaphysics has become the “new orthodoxy”: something everywhere believed by (almost) everyone.” (RT, 89)
Vanhoozer seeks to counter this mischaracterization of classical theism. He writes,
“…to explain classical theism in terms of a “fall” into Hellenistic philosophy is too simplistic. Such a theory overlooks the significance of the properly biblical and theological reasons for the tradition’s trajectory…The God of what we may call biblical-theological classical theism is neither indifferent nor apathetic but “with us” and “for us.”
We must conclude, then, that the legacy of patristic, medieval, and post-Reformation Protestant theology is not as captive to Greek philosophy as the “standard account” suggests. We would therefore feel free to draw upon what these theologians actually said – about divine personhood, the love of God, and divine suffering – as we navigate our way through the current debates.” (RT, 92-93)
Three points should be made. First, obviously by “classical theism” Vanhoozer is referring to earlier theologies that have come to expression in the theology and soteriology of the Reformed Calvinist tradition. It is with this tradition’s theological conclusions, and equally as important, their unique process of theological reasoning, that many non-Calvinist Christians take issue. But it should be noted that many non-Calvinist and Arminian believers would place themselves in the line of “classical theism.” We embrace the biblical elements of the Reformation and “classical theology” but are not convinced that the Augustinian, Thomistic or Calvinist understanding of God’s eternal decree, predestination, election, grace, and faith are biblically accurate. On many other points of theology we do agree, but we find no biblical support for the Reformed Calvinist interpretations of an eternal decree that ordains “whatsoever comes to pass,” God’s deterministic sovereignty, election as unconditional, an “effectual call,” a limited atonement, grace reduced to a decision of God in eternity past and faith as a “gift” granted by God to a select few that negates the possibility that all sinners can believe and be saved. All these distort the content of the gospel and make it fall short as “good news.” These are obviously no small matters, indeed they are the essential matters of the Christian faith and therefore many of us believe the core of biblical, evangelical truth is at stake with all its implications for life and ministry.
Secondly, before many of us who disagree with Reformed Calvinism ever heard of “The Theory of Theologies Fall” or the influences of Hellenistic philosophy and Greek metaphysics on “classical theism,” we came to similar conclusions about Reformed Calvinism. We were forced to conclude that “classical theism is no innocent conceptual scheme” and distorts “the biblical testimony, making it difficult in the extreme to do justice to the notion of a loving personal God who enters into reciprocal relations with his finite, fragile human creatures…” We concluded “That the God of classical theism is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob…” We came to these convictions on the basis of a thorough reading and study of the Scriptures themselves in the light of the teachings of Reformed Calvinist theology, not on the basis of embracing the idea that classical theism was influenced by Hellenistic and Greek thought. This may be the case, but this need not be relevant to the evaluation of Reformed Calvinism’s validity strictly from within a biblical context. The influences upon Reformed Calvinist thought that have shaped its theology are important questions, but only of secondary importance. What Calvinist theology presently teaches as compared to Scripture is of primary importance. It is to the Scriptures that our theological propositions remain accountable. That Calvinist theology proves rationally incoherent with much of what is clearly taught in the Bible is the crucial concern. Indeed, this problem is one of hermeneutics.
For many biblical scholars rational coherence is integral to a biblical hermeneutic, and the evidence of rational incoherence in Reformed thought has forced many to move away from it. For example, Karl Barth, in his Preface to volume two of his Church Dogmatics expressed that he was compelled to make this theological shift away from Reformed soteriology. He wrote,
“I would have preferred to follow Calvin’s doctrine of predestination much more closely, instead of departing from it so radically. I would have preferred, too, to keep to the beaten tracks when considering the basis of ethics. But I could not and cannot do so. As I let the Bible itself speak to me on these matters, as I meditated upon what I seemed to hear, I was driven irresistibly to reconstruction.”
Christian philosopher Jeremy Evans describes his movement away from Calvinist thought.
“I moved from a Reformed view of the will to a libertarian view during my time as a seminary student. Interestingly, the move occurred not because of my professors; most of my professors were admittedly Calvinists. Instead, I grew to consider libertarianism as the view with the least pressing problems ranging over the most significant areas of inquiry. It was hard enough reconciling determinism with a meaningful account of human freedom and even harder to understand how God, knowing that everyone is in need of a Savior, would not enable everyone to accept the offer of new life in Christ. I felt the intellectual transition away from Geneva was needed to avoid what I considered to be problems bigger than those faced by non-Reformed views of the will. Ken Keathly makes an excellent point here in defense of Molinism (a libertarian view of freedom):
If Molinists have to appeal to mystery…they do so at a better and more reasonable point. I’d rather have the Molinist difficulty of not being able to explain how God’s omniscience operates than the Calvinist difficulty of explaining how God is not the author of sin. In other words, Molinism’s difficulties are with God’s infinite attributes rather than His holy and righteous character.[1]
These same sentiments provided the impetus for my journey away from Geneva.”[2]
I believe a thorough comparison of the teachings of Reformed Calvinism with a careful examination of biblical data while employing a sound biblical hermeneutic that takes seriously the necessity for rational coherence should persuade one to arrive at similar conclusions.
Thirdly, many of us therefore strongly disagree with Vanhoozer’s suggestion that “classical theism,” when referring to Reformed Calvinism, has “properly biblical and theological reasons for the tradition’s trajectory…” and that “The God of what we may call biblical-theological classical theism is neither indifferent nor apathetic but “with us” and “for us.” This simply rings hollow in light of an eternal decree, unconditional election and an effectual call by which God unchangeably predestined a multitude of persons to an eternity in hell. Vanhoozer may be correct in his defense of Reformed theology against those who claim this theology has come to be what it is by incorporating Hellenistic and Greek philosophy, but even if it is “not as captive to Greek philosophy as the “standard account” suggests,” and even if this theology claims biblical support, as it surely does, many of us find that it fails on the basis that it is rationally and biblically incoherent. Its biblical basis is therefore flawed. That is, Calvinists have seriously misinterpreted the biblical texts they claim support their theology.
Reformed Calvinism obviously generates serious biblical, logical, moral and salvific epistemic difficulties. Calvinists themselves acknowledge this. Essentially, the Reformed Calvinist’s approach to defending their theology is to ultimately dismiss the biblical, rational, and moral critique by which we discern it as problematic and determine true from false interpretations. They do this by claiming their theology to be a “high mystery,” “incomprehensible to human reason,” or an “apparent contradiction.” Yet they seek to provide rationally coherent explanations for this mysteriously incomprehensible and contradictory theology. They claim “faith seeking understanding,” but dismiss the understanding (i.e., cannons of reason and logic, moral intuitions, etc.) which are necessary to inform their faith. They seek explanations that will make God’s sovereignty, defined deterministically, compatible with human freedom. These attempts only serve to confirm the necessity of incorporating rational coherence into theological interpretation, not just apply it afterwards in an attempt to make what is inherently contradictory plausible. We all confess, whether we follow it as a rule or not, that what we propose, even about God and “spiritual things” must be rationally coherent. But this rational coherence is sacrificed upon the altar of the Calvinist’s deterministic doctrines of the eternal decree and divine sovereignty.”
Vanhoozer’s “speech act” and literary theories approach is a new compatibilism among all the other compatibilist attempts to make something that is inevitably deterministic appear that it is not. But rather than revisit the biblical and rational incongruity and inconsistency of his Reformed Calvinist sovereignty and interpretive conclusions, taking such incongruity and inconsistency to be a reliable indicator that something is amiss in his interpretations and hermeneutical methodology, like all Calvinists Vanhoozer seeks a way to maintain his theological determinism despite the logical, moral, biblical, and gospel incoherence it generates.
Two scholars reading the same texts come to diametrically opposed theological conclusions. Therefore, we take it that the problem lies not in the texts but in the hermeneutical methodologies of the interpreters. Vanhoozer contends that Reformed Calvinist theology has not imbibed foreign influences and is a biblical theology. The former may be true. I contend that the latter is not, for this theology is mired in logical, moral, and epistemological difficulties. I submit that the nature and tenacity of these difficulties confirm that its interpretive conclusions are not valid. Being able to successfully relieve the incoherencies that require the Calvinist to flee to “high mystery,” “incomprehensibility” and claim “apparent contradiction” or that “the Bible teaches both…” is integral to a sound biblical hermeneutic. Remythologizing Theology is Vanhoozer’s attempt to do so. There are alternatives to Reformed Calvinism that relieve these difficulties on the basis of a sound hermeneutic that does not produce interpretive incoherence, inconsistency, and contradiction. Vanhoozer’s problem is that he is convinced that allegiance to the determinist God of Reformed thought equates to the supreme expression of religious devotion. Calvinists cherish their ability to accept the Calvinist depiction of God no matter how distorted that divine character becomes under the weight of their deterministic definition of his sovereignty. I contend that the Calvinist’s god is not “the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” or the God incarnate in Jesus Christ. (RT, 89) Certainly, there is truth in Vanhoozer’s claims that God acts “communicatively,” but in these various essays I believe I have demonstrated that this is an insufficient remedy for the underlying determinism inherent in his Reformed Calvinist theology. I have show on a biblical-hermeneutical basis, that the God of Reformed Calvinism most certainly acts with absolute causality and instrumentally upon the elect and indifferently and apathetically to the non-elect, and for them, this God is anything but “with us” and “for us.” (RT, 92-93)
[1] See Ken Keathly, “A Molinist View of Election, or How to Be a Consistent Infralapsarian,” in Calvinism: A Southern Baptist Dialogue (ed. E. Ray Clendenen and B. Waggoner; Nashville: B&H Academic, 2008), 214.
[2] Jeremy A. Evans, “Reflections on Determinism and Human Freedom,” in Whosoever Will: A Biblical-Theological Critique of Five Point Calvinism (ed. David L. Allen and Steve W. Lemke, Nashville: B&H Publishing Group, 2010), 274.
The Truth of the Gospel 