J. Gresham Machen And The Theology Of Crisis

By Annette G. Aubert

[Annette G. Aubert is a Ph.D. student in Historical Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary.]

I. Introduction

J. Gresham Machen (1881–1937), the brilliant biblical and New Testament scholar and apologist, is typically considered to have been a leading conservative in the Modernist-Fundamentalist conflict at the beginning of the twentieth century. There is no doubt that Machen was a man who engaged in the great debate for the defense of Christian truth. A large number of historical scholars identify Machen as a Fundamentalist;[1] however, closer examination suggests that there exists an alternative view regarding the question of whether Machen may be called a Fundamentalist.

In this study it will be suggested that Machen maintained some positions of the Fundamentalists[2] but not enough to justify the label “Fundamentalist.” To be sure, Machen was “not just another Fundamentalist” like William Jennings Bryan, as Mencken, Machen’s contemporary, has rightly concluded. Rather he was a man of fine scholarship and of distinct wisdom.[3] Along similar lines, John Murray noted that “Machen was in the first rank of Christian scholars.”[4] At this point it is important to note the fact that those who were Fundamentalists were identified by a strong “anti-doctrinal, anti-intellectual, and anti-liturgical” disposition.[5] Giving consideration to these observations, it is argued that it is more appropriate to classify Machen as a scholar who both preserved historic Christianity and advocated the orthodox faith.[6] Accordingly, the purpose of this study is to manifest how Machen was distinct in his scholarship and methodology from the Fundamentalists of his time.[7]

In order to demonstrate that Machen’s scholarship was distinct from that of the Fundamentalists, special attention will be paid to Machen’s encounter with European scholarship, especially with Neo-orthodoxy. As a result, it will be important to discern the manner in which Machen could have explored a synthesis between the Ritschlian school and the Barthian movement. Before considering Machen’s assessment of Neo-orthodoxy it is essential to discern Machen’s theological methodology; therefore, the first part of this paper explores the method that Machen employed in the study of the New Testament. The second part of this paper analyzes Machen’s encounter with Neoorthodoxy, particularly his analysis of Karl Barth. In order to understand fully both Machen’s theological method and his appraisal of Neo-orthodoxy, it is necessary to survey Machen’s historical-religious context. For the sake of brevity, this paper will limit this background survey to a few aspects only.

II. Historical-Religious Background

As early as 1870 the intellectual and cultural seeds that cultivated liberalism could be noticed in the United States, and the effect of liberalism on Protestantism in Germany was a well-recognized fact.[8] American theologians were aware that German scholars set forth hypotheses that caused divisions over the Bible and its relation to history and science.[9] Ira Brown is of the opinion that the adaptations in theology at the end of the nineteenth century are more important than the ones that were part of the Reformation.[10] One of the major shifts to occur was that theology was adapted to fit the science of evolution.[11] Moreover, when American biblical scholars embraced higher criticism from Germany, German theology was furthered in American academia and remained part of American academic endeavor into the new century.[12]

Two figures can illustrate briefly this migration of theological tendencies from the German to American academic arena. Charles A. Briggs (1841–1913), well known for his heresy trials, offended many orthodox Presbyterians through remarks made on the authority of Scripture during his inaugural address for his chair in biblical theology.[13] Walter Rauschenbach’s idea of the social gospel, adapted from the theology of A. Ritschl, became a powerful influence on both the popular and scholarly levels. He believed that redemption was “the voluntary socializing of the soul.”[14] In their own ways, both men help to exemplify the existing tension between conservatives and liberals over doctrines relating to Scripture and salvation.

Not only did the American academy embrace liberalism, but, as William Hutchison clearly shows, by 1920 the views of liberalism “had become accepted and respectable in more than a third of the pulpits of American Protestantism and in at least half the educational, journalistic, social, and literary or theological expressions of Protestant church life.”[15] Especially noteworthy is the appearance of Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878–1969), who was one of the most important supporters of Protestant liberalism.[16] The modification of theology to modern culture resulted in the emphasis of the immanence of God in culture, the excellence of human beings, the kingdom of God, religious feeling, and morality in religion.[17] Conservatives, however, did not remain silent about the changes that took place. For example, William J. Bryan (1860–1925) opposed the teaching of evolution and criticized liberalism in his books and “Bryan Bible Talks.”[18] Between 1910 and 1925 a twelve-volume series of treatises was compiled, The Fundamentals, which reflected the views of the historical Protestant faith.[19]

By 1924 a work by Shailer Mathews entitled The Faith of Modernism was published, containing many thoughts that reflected much of the scientific ideas of his time, viz., religion did not have its foundation in an “objective knowledge of God,” but is rightly discerned by “social or historical development.”[20] The Christian church of the United States faced a dilemma of faith identical to that which faced evangelicals in Europe half a century earlier.[21]

Witnessing how liberalism became a current religion and how conservatives failed to engage in a theological dispute caused Machen distress.[22] Unlike many of the conservatives of Machen’s time, he engaged in the battle against Modern Liberalism in a scholarly fashion.[23] Not only did he oppose the liberal phenomenon that occurred in his own denomination, the Presbyterian Church of the United States, but he also kept up with the study of European developments and engaged in providing a response to some of the continental liberal trends. In Machen’s The Origin of Paul’s Religion and The Virgin Birth of Christ his interaction with European scholarship is most notable. It is important to acknowledge that Machen, in challenging Modern Liberalism, did not confront just a theological idea, as Clair Davis rightly observes, but rather a dynamic and living trend.[24]

III. J. Gresham Machen and Liberalism

While engaging in the fight against liberalism, Machen was certain that a plain disagreement with the adversary was not a persuasive argument; hence, he concluded that “before a man can refute successfully an argument of an opponent, he must understand the argument that he is endeavoring to refute.”[25] The basic point for Machen was that one needs to possess knowledge about a subject in order to point to its error. This was a general principle that Machen applied in his own approach to liberal scholarship. It was essential for Machen to know fairly well the theoretical bases of the liberals to provide an answer; hence, he familiarized himself with their primary sources. In contrast to Machen, many of the Fundamentalists of Machen’s day thought it to be irrelevant to be informed about liberal scholarship.

It is helpful to recall briefly that Machen himself encountered German liberalism firsthand while he was a student in Germany and during his years as a student at Johns Hopkins University. It is to be noted, however, that the liberalism that Machen encountered in Germany was more thoroughgoing than that at Hopkins and raised some doubts about his Christian faith.[26] The mental and spiritual confusion that Machen experienced was due to the encounter with liberal theology, not only before his coming to Germany but also after he left.[27] Most likely it dealt with matters of the historical legitimacy of the records of Jesus in the New Testament and of Christianity’s origin.[28] Hence, it is preferable to interpret Machen’s experience in Germany as an event that in the end strengthened his faith and helped him to provide a clear response to liberal theology.[29] This may also explain his strong emphasis on the historicity of Christianity; maintaining the oneness of “history and faith.” As a result, of Machen’s own conclusions he produced various addresses and writings that dealt with subjects like the incarnation and resurrection of Christ, where he clearly presented the historical credibility of the account of Scripture while disproving the approach of modernism.[30]

IV. Machen’s Method of New Testament Study

Before we discuss in more detail Machen’s encounter with Neo-orthodoxy it is essential to pay brief attention to Machen’s methodology of the study of the New Testament. As Deane Ferm has correctly pointed out, Machen cannot be considered a “biblical literalist.”[31] He distinguished himself from the literal approach of the Fundamentalists of his time. While Machen studied at Johns Hopkins University he was introduced to the modern scientific method of study of ancient books, and he considered it quite valuable to employ this method in examination of the writings of Scripture.[32] It also is to be recognized that when Machen studied the New Testament at Princeton Seminary, William P. Armstrong, the director of the New Testament department, used the modern scientific method.[33] Accordingly, Machen continued to employ the modern scientific method that he was taught at Princeton to the study of the New Testament. Further, Darryl Hart reminds us that the Reformed concept of concursus and providence played a significant role in Princeton Seminary’s doctrine of Scripture.[34] Machen himself adopted this doctrine of the Scripture in his approach to the New Testament. Moreover, it ought to be noted that while Machen appreciated suggestions of contemporary critics, he considered with caution the “historical and linguistic” evidence; at the same time, he upheld the notion “what shall we think of Jesus Christ?” should not be abandoned.[35]

Machen mentioned on one occasion that modern scholars labored diligently in their “quest for the historical Jesus”; in fact, he believed that they did a distinguished work.[36] At the same time, he affirmed that their endeavor resulted in error.[37] According to Machen, modern criticism readily allowed the Gospel accounts to be historical, but from their perspective they ought not be interpreted supernaturally. Rather, all the events were to be explained naturally.[38] Machen disagreed strongly with this approach. By taking the supernatural from the study of the Gospels, “the historian finds to his dismay that he has cast doubt upon much that remains, and that he is constantly approaching the absurd view that no such person as Jesus ever lived.”[39] One of the root problems with liberalism’s approach to the New Testament is that it originated from Naturalism, whereby all “creative power of God” is disputed.[40] It is significant to note that the new method whereby every book ought to be studied as any other human book belittled the divine element of the Bible, leaving the interpreter to deal mainly with the “historical and critical” issues.[41] Machen had shown with particular clarity that when the natural and supernatural are separated from the Gospels, as in modern liberalism, a “liberal Jesus” was the necessary result.[42]

Although Machen himself employed modern scientific method in the study of the New Testament, it is clear that unlike the liberals he maintained a supernatural interpretation of the Bible. In Christianity and Liberalism he remarked that

the distinction between ‘natural’ and ‘supernatural’ does not mean, indeed, that nature is independent of God; it does not mean that God brings to pass supernatural events, natural events are not brought to pass by Him. On the contrary, the believer in the supernatural regards everything that is done as being the work of God.[43]

Machen has noted here an important feature about his theological foundation. His statement that God governs both the natural and supernatural allows him to employ the modern scientific method without rejecting the divine element.

V. Religion and Science

Not only did Liberal Modernism deny the supernatural interpretation of Scripture; it also undertook to maintain religion by making a separation between religion and science.[44] For Machen it was not new that theologians in the United States forsook the “historic principium of the Reformed Theology.”[45] He mentions in one of his letters that the refusal of the grammatico-historical exegesis appears to be a typical feature of the “anti-intellectualism” of his time.[46] While Machen himself affirmed the correlation between orthodoxy and science, he preferred to call his method “scientific historical method.”[47] At this point it is useful to look at Harry Emerson Fosdick’s views in contrast to Machen’s method. For Fosdick, the original intention and meaning of an author of Scripture becomes increasingly foreign to the modern man as scientific scholars try to understand the Bible’s “historic significance.”[48] Machen has shown that one of the weakest points of Fosdick’s The Modern Use of the Bible is his refusal to apply the historical method.[49] Fosdick presented a Christianity that resembled a “progressive movement,” meaning that Christianity adapted to the surrounding and transforming culture.[50] Accordingly, this approach advocated by Fosdick did not stand on objective facts; rather, Christianity was most clearly recognized by “social or historical development.”[51] Machen’s method dealt largely with objective facts. For him Christianity rested on historical facts and not historical developments, implying that religion could not be separated from science.

In his book What is Faith? Machen revealed his clearest opposition to the departure of religion from science.[52] Machen noted that the current “religious literature” that rejected the “scientific historical method” was indeed a significant issue, even among those who believed that they were partaking in the scientific development.[53] In Machen’s opinion,

It is highly misleading, therefore, to say that religion and science are separate, and that the Bible is not intended to teach science … the Bible does teach certain things about which science has a right to speak. The matter is particularly clear in the sphere of history. At the very centre of the Bible are assertions about events in the external world in Palestine in the first century of our era—events the narrating of which constitutes the “gospel,” the piece of good news upon which our Christian faith is based.[54]

It was essential for Machen to stress that the gospel message itself is based on historical events. Consequently, what is certain of Christianity is that it relies upon “facts in the external world,” facts that science may justifiably address.[55] Machen understood that there were those who believed that Scripture would not lose any of its orthodox significance even in the case where scientific history would prove that Christ’s resurrection never took place, but this is not a Christian attitude.[56] The proper approach was to consider the facts.[57]

In Religion and Facts Machen showed very clearly how Modernism understood itself as isolated from science.[58] For Machen, the historical events of the New Testament cannot be separated from science. To illustrate this, when the Bible recorded the event of Christ’s resurrection it clearly illustrated science.[59] Machen claimed that “true science” considered not only a few facts, but every fact.[60] The Bible becomes ineffectual unless it is a book that is based on facts.[61] And for Machen it was very clear that “there is nothing in modern science that invalidates the teaching of the Bible regarding God’s care for His creatures; nay, there is much that wonderfully confirms it.”[62]

If Christianity is established on facts, said Machen, then it cannot be denied that it has dependence on science, since every fact “must be brought into some sort of relation.”[63]To be sure, the “true sphere of history” deals with the foundation of each reality.[64]

Naturally, the question is raised, if Christianity and modern culture stand in such opposition, can the problem only be solved by the demolition “of one or the other of the contending forces”?[65] Machen suggested that the solution was not to abolish one or the other, but to introduce the idea of “consecration.”[66] Science should not be rejected or viewed as insignificant; instead, scientific knowledge should be acquired “with all the enthusiasm of the veriest humanist” and yet should also be dedicated to God’s benefit.[67] For Machen, “consecration” of man’s control to the creator did not demolish man’s control but increased it. However, conformity to any mortal government would result in the deadly end of both art and science.[68] Consequently, what was required, according to Machen, was attention to the care for the “problems of theological science.”[69] Machen’s analysis of some of the liberals as unscientific placed the demand upon conservatives to be rigidly scientific in order to support their claim for the truthfulness of Christianity.[70]

VI. The Urge for Historical Study

Machen’s method for studying the New Testament must be examined in proper relationship to his understanding of history and truth, which is to say that his notions of history and faith rely on Scottish Common Sense Realism. While the Princetonians adopted Common Sense philosophy to oppose “the skepticism of Hume,” Machen more specifically used its epistemology to provide an apology for the historicity of Christianity.[71]

In his study of historical awareness, Grant Wacker observes that Machen’s view of history highlighted human beings and concerns that he selected from former times; yet in the end, because Machen made much of eternal truths, it appeared to be a “world without history.”[72] Wacker’s analysis of Machen is certainly mistaken when he concludes that Machen was a-historical. While looking at Machen’s writings one will notice how great an emphasis he places again and again on the importance of the historical approach to the study of the New Testament. The fact that Christianity is based on historical facts was indeed one of Machen’s main premises. Machen showed himself to be ill at ease with the a-historical method of the study of the New Testament of his day. In the section below it will become evident, pace Wacker, how Machen himself promoted the opposite of the a-historical approach. Similarly, George Marsden, showed that Machen struggled indeed with the whole matter of history, which in fact was a decisive concern of his time.[73] Terry Chrisope moved along similar lines of interpretation while viewing Machen as a great example for the historical approach to Scripture.[74]

Particularly notable was that at Machen’s inauguration as Assistant Professor at Princeton Seminary on 3 May 1915, he himself chose to speak on the subject of “History and Faith.”[75] This inauguration address already indicated how essential this matter was to him. At the opening of his inaugural speech he emphasized that the one who studied the New Testament must be essentially an “historian.”[76] In Machen’s own words, “The center and the core of the Bible is history. Everything else that it contains is fitted into an historical framework and leads up to an historical climax.”[77] The New Testament is fundamentally an historical writing; therefore, it must be analyzed like an historical subject.[78] Since Christianity was established on facts of history, claimed Machen, it needs to be studied like history.[79] Faith and history cannot be separated, since “true faith involves an intellectual element.”[80] To be sure, Machen’s affirmation that faith had its foundation on knowledge stands in complete opposition to the religious Weltanschauung of his day.[81]

It is instructive at this point to compare Machen to the German scholar Adolf von Harnack and his views on history. Both Machen and von Harnack promoted the historic study of the New Testament, but they certainly differed in their presuppositions and conclusions. Interestingly, von Harnack presented a lecture in Berlin in 1895 entitled “Christianity and History” in which he sought to demonstrate how Christianity could be articulated so as to rely on facts of history.[82] What is remarkable is that Adolf von Harnack expressed a view similar to Machen’s with regard to one’s approach to the Bible and Christianity. Martin Rumscheidt reminds us that von Harnack’s discipline was theology, yet the method that he applied as theologian was that of “the modern science of history.” Therefore, von Harnack was as a theologian an “historian.”[83] Both men stressed the importance of approaching Scripture as an historian. Though Machen and von Harnack may have agreed on the importance of the study of history, it is clear that von Harnack began from a presupposition totally different from Machen’s and that in his application of the historical scientific method he had a different agenda. As it has been noted earlier, Machen could employ the modern scientific method yet at the same time he held to a supernatural view of the Bible as his presupposition, whereas von Harnack’s presupposition to the study of the New Testament depended on autonomous reason. He had no room for the supernatural interpretation of Scripture. Von Harnack’s theological task was to return to the essence of Christianity. He attempted to reconstruct the gospel of Jesus from the initial outlook of the Christian religion. The result of von Harnack’s reconstruction was the “liberal Jesus.” Machen’s aim was not to reconstruct the Christian message, but rather to maintain the historicity of Christianity and its message—the Good News which is based on historical facts.

Machen stressed throughout his writings the idea that Christianity was a religion based on historical facts. The entire corpus of the New Testament relies on one happening, argued Machen, the redemption that Christ supplied is based on His death and resurrection.[84] Equally important, to neglect this essential event of the New Testament makes impossible reliable historical exegesis.[85]

In the Witness of the Gospels Machen noted that Modern criticism applied a method to the New Testament that all was a-historical.[86] He stressed that many aimed to divorce Christianity from history, which was in fact a false endeavor.[87] Again it is interesting to see how Adolf von Harnack in his strong emphasis on historical study continued along parallel lines with Machen, declaring that the attack in the eighteenth century against the correlation between “religion and history has, in fact, proved to be a failure.”[88]

A mere philosophical theism without history, stated Machen, is ultimately bankrupt.[89] It may result in a high morality, but it will not preserve the gospel, which has its foundation in history.[90] As Machen made so clear, a gospel without history did not exist.[91] Machen took into account that if a person considers all historical knowledge then he will be persuaded to the Christian faith. He also acknowledges that one cannot assess each truth if the truth of sin is dismissed.[92]

What is important to note concerning Machen’s historical approach is his notion that the New Testament provides not only pure facts, but also maintains the implication of these facts. The implication of these facts is derived from “supernatural revelation.”[93] For Machen, historical facts and doctrine could not be divorced from each other. The apostles not only stated the mere fact that “Christ died”; they stressed the doctrine that “Christ died for our sins.”[94] The situation of the day was that Modern Liberalism advocated a view that placed experience prior to doctrine. In response Machen spelled out the importance of historical facts and their doctrinal implications, remarking that “it is quite incorrect to say that not only the historical facts about Christ but also the facts of Christian experience come first and then the doctrinal interpretation of these facts comes afterwards. On the contrary, it is of the very essence of Christianity that doctrine comes before Christian experience.”[95] Elsewhere Machen stated that Scripture brings first forth “truth,” both truth that is immutable with respect to God and truth dealing with “redemptive facts of history.” On this truth support is found for moral requirements within culture.[96]

Having noted these elements of Machen’s methodology, we may conclude that Machen remained faithful to the modern scientific method of New Testament study that he had adopted at Johns Hopkins University and Princeton Theological Seminary. As we have seen, a common methodology of Modern Liberalism was to deal only with the human aspect of Scripture, but Machen maintained a divine and a human approach to Scripture. The notion that Christian religion is based on historical facts is a dominant and consistent idea in Machen’s writings. Additionally, Machen’s scientific historical method of New Testament Study continued unwavering, always stressing the importance of the union of religion and science. Likewise he maintained the harmony of history and faith. Machen could speak positively about those with whom he ultimately disagreed, such as von Harnack. Both men stressed the importance of the historical approach to the establishment of Christianity, yet arrived at different conclusions.

VII. Machen’s Assessment of Neo-orthodoxy

Due weight should be given to the fact that Machen did not pen a large work on Karl Barth as did his colleague Cornelius Van Til. It also is essential to note that initial interpretations of Barthian teaching in the United States began only in the late twenties through different articles and book reviews, whereas significant evaluations in book form did not appear before 1930.[97] As early as 1928 Machen expressed some initial thoughts in a paper entitled “Karl Barth and the ‘Theology of Crisis’,” which presented an assessment of Neo-orthodoxy. Machen voiced his opinion in other sources about this new movement as well. For example, in Machen’s correspondence with various individuals he shared his viewpoints about Neo-orthodoxy and Karl Barth. It is necessary to integrate these varied writings by Machen in order to provide a clearer picture of his position. Additionally, this study will deal briefly with the historical question as to how various other theologians of Machen’s epoch responded to the rise of Neo-orthodoxy.[98]

According to Machen’s own assessment it appears that when Neo-orthodoxy or the so-called Barthian movement first emerged he himself was not too well acquainted with this movement.[99] Still, Machen read sufficiently enough to spark his interest in the movement, particularly in his reading of Emil Brunner’s work Die Mystik und das Wort, and also Der Mittler.[100] Considering the fact that the “theology of crisis” crossed the Atlantic slowly, Machen was rather familiar with some of its principal beliefs. As Chrisope rightly pointed out, Machen continued to keep up with the scholarly world in Europe. Machen’s discussion of Karl Barth as early as 1928 shows clearly his maintaining familiarity with European scholarship, likewise his interest for the preservation of the historicity of Christianity.[101] It is interesting to note that a few of Machen’s contemporaries made a comparison between Machen and Barth. At this point we shall give attention to Albert Knudsen’s view on Karl Barth and J. Gresham Machen. For him Karl Barth applied a new method to this Christian doctrine—this “new theology” combines “the old and the new,” whereas Machen did not bring a new interpretation of the traditional doctrines, but rather remained faithful to the essential doctrine of historic Christianity.[102]

Machen in his paper on “Karl Barth and the ‘Theology of Crisis’,” which he presented to a group of ministers in Philadelphia on April 23, 1928,[103] mentioned that to comprehend the whole teaching of the Barthian movement was not an easy task, and it may be that further acquaintance with it might alter his comprehension of this movement.[104] Nevertheless Machen rightly identified Karl Barth with “the theology of crisis,” which compels an individual to make a decision when he faces the “dreadful antinomy between time and eternity, the world and God.”[105]

VIII. A Critique of Modern Liberalism

While looking at Machen’s interpretation of Karl Barth, it must be noted that both men shared some similar positions. Both men criticized and reacted against Modern Liberalism.[106] PaulWoolley agreed with Machen that the great benefit of Barth’s teaching was its refutation of those that tried to base “their weak theories on the sufficiency of man.”[107]

Some of the similar positions between Machen and Barth that are mentioned below may be explained by Barth’s attempt to return to the application of some Reformation doctrines.[108] In spite of similar convictions, it is surely not to suggest that Machen was a Barthian. But Machen may appear in some respects to be closer to Barthian teaching that Modern Liberalism. However, in his core beliefs and epistemology he is in disagreement with Barth.

With respect to the development of dogma, Machen pointed out that Barthian teaching marked a shift in the history of theology or dogma; hence, this teaching turned away from pantheism, mysticism, Schleiermacher’s idea of das absolute Gefühl der Abhängigkeit, Hegelian philosophy, and Ritschlian moralism.[109] Machen himself criticized the idea of pantheism,[110] and of equal importance, he clearly expressed his views against the whole idea of religious experience without doctrine. Machen did concur with Barth’s belief against Modern Liberalism that the basis of Jesus’ life was not what he taught or his pattern for living, but rather his redeeming work.[111] In “Christianity vs. Modern Liberalism,” Machen suggested that Modern Liberalism missed the chief “life purpose” of Christ which was found in his “atoning death.”[112] Although both Barth and Machen may agree on the importance of Christ’s redeeming work, Barth differs sharply from Machen’s view of the historical Jesus.

Though Machen praised liberal scholars for their interest in “the historical Jesus,” at the same time he concluded that the result of “the liberal Jesus” disagreed with Scripture itself.[113] Barth rejected the liberal Jesus since it began with man; hence, destroying the “qualitative distinction” that existed between God and man and it does not share anything with the “Jesus of the Bible.”[114] Certainly, Machen would delight in the Barthian dismissal of “the liberal Jesus.”[115] And when Machen spoke about the Barthian teaching that God could not be recovered in the experience of man, he may have reflected on his own views as expressed in some of his writings, rejecting the mere experiential emphasis in modern theology.[116]

Machen clearly recognized that the core of Barth’s thought was expressed in the schlechthin Andere [“completely other”], which showed the immense dualism that exists between man and God.[117] Here Machen certainly agreed more with Calvin than with Barth; the former said that “nomancan survey himself without forthwith turning his thoughts toward the God in whom he lives and moves.”[118] Yet for Barth this dualism had its source in sin, and Machen observed in this notion a significant Christian feature.[119] In fact, for Barth one of the principal mistakes of Modern Liberalism was the annihilation of the wall between God and man which existed because of sin.[120] Barth defined sin as man considering himself to be God [ jene Vergöttlichung des Menschen].[121] To illustrate some of the liberal notions of Machen’s day, wemay observe once again the presuppositions Harry Emerson Fosdick set forth. Fosdick rejected “the old dualism against which the ancient church had so long and fierce a conflict, but a gladly recognized affinity between God and man. In our theology no longer are the divine and human like oil and water that cannot mix; rather, all the best in us is God in us.”[122] What is important to note here is that Machen himself accused Modern Liberalism of having missed the chasm that existed between God and man.[123]

Likewise it is valuable to compare both Machen and Barth regarding sin. Machen accused Modern Liberalism for losing the realization of sin; in fact, he believed that “according to Modern Liberalism, there is really no such thing as sin.”[124] For Barth it was clear that this separation between God and man could only be bridged by God approaching man through special revelation, which came senkrecht von oben [“directly from above”].[125] Modern Liberalism overstressed the immanence of God, argued Barthianism, so that the separation between God and man was eradicated.[126] Barth himself went so far as to reject any natural revelation. Over against Barth, Machen believed that, “Revelation of God through nature” was still a living aspect of theology and should not be rejected.[127] Regarding the word of God, it was clear that Barth would not seek to objectify God’s word or to understand it as fixed, as for example in Machen’s notion where God’s word is the “supreme text-book” regarding the matter of faith.[128] In contrast to Machen, for Barth the Bible itself turned into only God’s word to man in the existential hour.[129]

Machen explained how Barth stressed God’s wrath as being the core of the Bible, which was in clear opposition to the Ritschlian idea of a loving God.[130] Interestingly, while speaking about the doctrine of salvation in Christianity and Liberalism Machen made the point that the modern liberals dismissed God’s wrath because of their blurry notion of sin.[131] Machen clearly maintained God’s wrath, viz., claiming that each human being through the Fall was placed under “God’s wrath and curse.”[132] “For salvation presupposes something from which a man is saved,” contested Machen, “it presupposes the awful wrath of a righteous God.”[133]

IX. Karl Barth’s Notion of Faith and History

The concept of faith played an important role in Barthian theology. Faith was God’s work in man.[134] For Barth it was obvious that the essential element by which Christianity could be discerned was “faith.”[135] Here it is important to acknowledge that in Barthian teaching Christianity was not understood and based on history, but was established on faith. Machen pointed out that in Barth’s teaching one found a strong accentuation that miracles such as the incarnation and others were received by faith, because such phenomena could not be comprehended by the human mind.[136] As it has been clearly shown, Machen placed much emphasis on the historical approach to the New Testament; hence, for Machen it was not clear if these Neo-orthodox theologians upheld the miracles’ historicity.[137]

Regarding the virgin birth, Machen insisted that this event must be recognized as a “fact of history.”[138] “We are often told,” said Machen, “that if the virgin birth is accepted, it can only be accepted as a matter of “faith,” and that a decision about it is beyond the range of historical science. But such a distinction between faith and history is very unfortunate.[139] It is important to note that for Barth miracles of the Bible are only “illustrations of the miracles”; thus, one cannot speak about their historicity.[140] As a matter of fact, miracles symbolize “das Ungeschichtliche” [“the unhistorical”], said Barth.[141] This view of Barth illustrates that he did not hold to the miracles’ historicity as Machen did. However, it must be kept in mind that for Barth the incarnation, resurrection and other supernatural events were “historical events,” but they were discerned only as historical happenings and these happenings are never an element of faith.[142] This was a basic element in Barth’s notion of faith. We may recall here that Barth owed much to Overbeck for finding another foundation for faith instead of history.[143] The dilemma of “history and faith” is not clarified by attempting to bring faith into dependence of a historical fact, yet “history and faith” are to be perceived in their dialectical relationship.[144] Barth made a clear division between history and faith to which Machen was surely opposed. Again, turning to one of Machen’s contemporaries, Zerbe expressed very clearly that Barth made a clear distinction between “faith and knowledge.”[145]

X. J. Gresham Machen’s Approval of Karl Barth

It is not surprising that Machen in his interpretation of Karl Barth believes that various elements of his theology are a reappearance of “evangelical Christianity.”[146] It is worth considering what Machen said elsewhere a few months later, he assessed it as a vast fallacy to understand Barthian thought “as a real return to the Lord Jesus Christ.”[147] Machen saw in Barth’s position numerous beliefs that were similar to his Reformed view. For example, he valued the fact that Barth reestablished theology by furnishing it with true honor.[148] Surely, Machen agreed with the idea that “the word of God is prior to Christian experience.”[149] As it has been already said in Christianity and Liberalism and elsewhere, great stress had been placed on the notion that doctrine came prior to Christian experience and Christian experience was always based on doctrine.[150] Machen certainly welcomed the Barthian teaching that opposed subjectivism.[151]

The positive attitude of Barthians towards “divine revelation,” like Machen, stood in stark contrast to the common perspective in his own day.[152] 2Yet it must be borne in mind that for Barth “the Bible has only one theological interest: the interest of God himself.”[153] 3AndonlyGodhimself is able to communicate reality about God.[154] Barth would certainly object to Machen’s view that “if a man were truly scientific, we think, he would be convinced of the truth of Christianity whether he were a saint or a demon; since the truth of Christianity does not all depend upon the state of the soul of the investigator, but is objectively fixed.”[155]

XI. The Shortcomings of Karl Barth

Machen in his assessment of Neo-orthodoxy certainly displayed his disagreements with this movement. First, Machen contended that the Barthians maintained a different epistemology, and second, they had a different understanding of historical data in Scripture.[156] Although Machen praised the recent theology in its opposition towards the “anti-intellectualism of the modern church,” he still wondered whether their “knowledge of God” was any true “knowledge at all.”[157] It is not surprising that Machen did raise this question, since he was highly interested in true knowledge and true facts which are the foundation of Christianity—the gospel itself.

For Machen, Barth’s view that God’s word was only acquired by faith was insufficient, saying that “we could never indeed reason out the truth of the things that God has told us in His Word, but to accept it as God’s Word is not contrary to reason but on the contrary is possible only when reason, by the act of God’s Spirit, ceases to be blinded by sin.”[158] Rev. Jenkins, one of Machen’s contemporaries, observed in his analysis of Karl Barth that the categorical removal of reason to obtain “knowledge” was the most essential and harmful aspect of Barthian’s thought and epistemology.[159] Machen made his view clear in a letter to Corum, indicating that the Barthian’s system rested on “a skeptical epistemology.”[160] His concern here was that Barth put aside “the objectivity of truth” and employed subjectivism by making, for example, the redeeming work of Christ only truthful if one accepts it by faith.[161] Machen noticed clearly that Barthians severed faith from “scientific history” concerning Christ’s existence.[162]

This phenomenon of the separation of science and faith that Machen observed among Modern Liberals was noted earlier. John McConnachie, in his assessment of Barth, made a similar observation. While making a comparison between Machen and Barth, McConnachie highlights the fact that Barth believed that the content of the New Testament was only a testimony for the first-century Christians, whereas the contemporary interpreter did not have “scientific facts” such as those with which the historian interacted.[163] This method differs from the Christian approach, contended Machen. Although believing that Jesus is the only mediator between God and humans, Barthians appear to be detached about the discoveries of “historical research.”[164] This is clear when Barth does not even show interest in history and Bible criticism, and so for him the nexus between the Bible and science was even more unacceptable.[165] From a Barthian point of view, “scientific fact” is not able to validate knowledge about Jesus’ life, for example, “the empty tomb,” but by faith this can be confirmed.[166] Machen saw here a real problem with the Barthian teaching that undermining “scientific history” makes room for faith.[167] As Jenkins comments, this “new paradox theology” has been criticized most sharply by Adolf von Harnack, who says that Barth’s “anti-historical tendencies are ‘simply incomprehensible.’ “[168] While reading Karl Barth, then, Machen discovered some similar critiques of Modern Liberalism, especially as regards the divorce of religion from science.

XII. Some Reconsideration of Karl Barth

It is beneficial to view Paul Woolley’s comments on Machen’s assessment of Karl Barth. He believed that Machen’s view on Barthian theology was not sufficiently negative. Certainly Machen pointed out Barth’s weaknesses, but there seem to be more hazards in the Barthian teaching than Machen flagged.[169] It is worth noting that three months subsequent to Machen’s paper he noted in a letter to Paul Woolley that the excitement of evangelicals regarding Karl Barth’s teaching was capable of causing much damage.[170]

In his survey article, “Forty Years of New Testament Research,” Machen picked up Karl Barth in his discussion. The Epistle to the Romans by Barth received only little praise from Machen.[171] The one positive aspect that may be noted in this work, said Machen, is that it communicates the question of what a man shall do to receive salvation.[172] Still, Machen affirmed some views that he valued earlier in Barthian teaching.

There is no doubt that Machen had a “mixed impression” of the Barthian thesis, though he continued to praise Barth’s opposition to liberalism.[173] Machen indicated in a letter that Karl Barth’s “On Christian Doctrine” was at least inspiring

over against the kind of thing that we have been having, it seems like a breath from higher and better world. Instead of human experience, we seem to have here a true insistence on the transcendence of God. Instead in finding God in a mere feeling of man, these men seem, at first sight at least, to be listening to God’s Word.[174]

From this statement it can be perceived that for Machen one of the basic points that he valued in Neo-orthodoxy was its emphasis on the Bible and its denunciation of subjectivism. Likewise he seems to make clear in some respect that he applauded the new emphasis on the transcendence of God, which was nearly erased by the theology of immanence.[175] Again, we may consider Adolf von Harnack, who is a good example of this theology and who believes that God’s kingdom resides in each individual’s soul.

After having read more of Karl Barth’s writings, Machen expressed some of his more mature impressions. He believed that the Barthian teaching was a “subtle thing,” which was separated from the clarity of Christ’s gospel.[176] In spite of their return to some Reformation doctrines, Barthians fail to embrace the position of the “historical testimony” of the “Reformation and the New Testament.”[177] This is one of the root problems from Machen’s perspective, which he identified as early as 1928. Here we should pay attention to Machen’s contemporary, Zerbe, and his final assessment of Barth. In his critical evaluation he concluded that Barthianism did not display Protestant theology, but rather was a “cosmic philosophy” whereby the basic doctrine of the Bible possessed a new connotation from the ancient creeds.[178]

Having read by 1936 one subsequent edition of the Dogmatik, Machen was even more convinced that this work was “more clearly contrary to the heart of the Christian faith than the former edition,” and again he saw explicitly how Barth resisted the historical foundation of Christianity.[179] With Machen’s interpretation of Karl Barth, we may notice again that there was another movement, Barthianism, that tried to make the Christian faith autonomous from “historical criticism.”[180]

XIII. Rolston’s Comparison of J. Gresham Machen and Karl Barth

Interestingly, Rolston in his presentation of Karl Barth made a comparison between Machen and Barth. He illustrated very well Machen’s critical assessment of Barth, saying that “in his attempt to meet the modernists Dr. Machen puts forward the historical facts of Christianity as the one sure basis of faith. What the historian sees is for him fundamental. He exposes himself to the full force of historical criticism.”[181] Rolston believed that these statements, picked up from McConnachie about Machen, were clear statements of the view Barth protested.[182] Moreover, he noted that the true disagreement between Barth and Machen lay not in the question of “the historical Jesus,” as both believed in his existence. Rather, the distinction lay in the “starting point of faith,” for Machen believed that one needs to begin with the facts of history, whereas Barth maintained that one needs to begin with Scripture that communes to “the heart” of the converted person.[183]

From Rolston’s comparison of Barth and Machen it may at first glance appear that Machen was less orthodox than Barth, since Barth’s starting point was faith itself and Scripture that communicates to the heart of the believer. In fact, Barth sounded very pious in his position. Nevertheless, Barth himself ended up with a sort of subjectivism, and did not stand in the continuation of the Reformation, whereas Machen believed with Calvin that faith was built on knowledge.[184] To be sure, the dismissal of this historical presupposition is one of the major problems in Barthian teaching from Machen’s point of view. That Machen came to this conclusion can certainly be traced back to his overall concern to present a Christian religion that was based on historical facts.

XIV. Conclusion

Machen distinguished himself from Fundamentalism in the way he defended orthodoxy and historic Christianity through his outstanding and recognized scholarship. The fact that he was acknowledged by European scholars and his own interaction with critical European scholarship made him an unique scholar, in contrast to some of his fundamentalistic contemporaries.

It was essential to Machen that Christian religion not have its foundation on experience, but on “historical facts—the birth, the life, death, and bodily resurrection of Jesus—and should not to be reduced to subjective ideas disconnected from history and science, as Protestant liberalism appeared to be doing.”[185] The essential idea that Christianity is a message based on historical facts continued throughout Machen’s writings to be a consistent theme.

In The Origin of Paul’s Religion, Machen posited a synthesis between the Ritschlian school of interpretation which included the historical Jesus and the radicals’ view which entailed a supernatural Jesus. In this work Machen tried to establish the following synthesis:

1. that the ‘Liberal’ or Ritschlian historians were right over against Wrede and other radicals in insisting that Paul possessed and cherished a knowledge of the real Jesus, but 2. that the radicals were right over the ‘Liberals’ in insisting that the Jesus whom Paul’s religion presupposes is no mere teacher of righteousness but a supernatural Redeemer come into the world for the salvation of men. The true synthesis, I argued, is found only when that supernatural Redeemer, presupposed in the Epistle of Paul and presented in detail in the Gospel, is held to be the real Jesus who walked upon this earth.[186]

It could be suggested with respect to Machen’s assessment of Karl Barth that he could have posited a similar synthesis between Karl Barth and the Ritschlian school of interpretation. In Machen’s assessment of Karl Barth, he was able to welcome some aspects of his theology, especially his concern for the Word of God versus experience, the removal of the liberal Jesus, and a new emphasis on God’s wrath and sin. Although true, Machen seemed to indicate that Barth fell short in his notion of history, faith, the importance of science and religion against the liberals who cared strongly for the historicity of the Christian religion. One the one hand, Machen acknowledged some of the liberals who were concerned about the historical facts on which Christianity relied. Yet he could not accept their dismissal of the supernatural and their “liberal Jesus.” Hence, for Machen such liberals as for example Adolf von Harnack were correct against Barth with respect to their concern for the historicity of Christianity.

J. Gresham Machen set a model for today’s Christian scholarship in the way he was able to interact with mainstream liberal scholars. He did not retreat into a monastery, but rather tried to understand his opponents by familiarizing himself with their views. He was able to agree with some of their positions while not abandoning orthodoxy. At the same time, he was concerned enough to provide a scholarly response to his opponents by putting forth polemics to defend orthodoxy.[187] Therefore, Machen is still crucial today for his example of scholarship and his orthodox defense of historic Christianity.

Notes

1. See, e.g., Mark A. Noll, A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992), 376. Douglas Herman identifies Machen as one of the Fundamentalist leaders (“Flooding the Kingdom: The Intellectual Development of Fundamentalism, 1930–1941” [Ph.D. diss., Ohio University, 1980], 235). Likewise Bradley J. Longfield places Machen in the category of Fundamentalists in The Presbyterian Controversy: Fundamentalists, Modernists, and Moderates (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991).
2. Machen maintained with other Fundamentalists the following doctrines: “1. The inerrancy of Scripture, 2. the virgin birth of Christ, 3. a substitutionary doctrine of atonement, 4. the bodily resurrection of Christ, 5. the veracity of biblical miracles” (Roy A. Harrisville and Walter Sundberg, The Bible in Modern Culture: Theology and Historical-Critical Method from Spinoza to Käsemann [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995], 188). Ned Stonehouse usefully observes that there were many crucial dissimilarities in positions between Machen and the Fundamentalists, yet Machen himself believed that the similarities that he shared with them were more basic than the dissimilarities. See Ned B. Stonehouse, J. Gresham Machen A Biographical Memoir (1954; repr., South Holland: Park Press, 1978), 338. Nevertheless, in “Christianity in Conflict” Machen communicates clearly that he does not call himself a Fundamentalist. See J. Gresham Machen, “Christianity in Conflict,” in Contemporary American Theology: Theological Autobiographies (ed. Vergilius Ferm; New York: Round Table Press, 1932), 270. Machen rather perceived himself as a Calvinist—”an adherent of the Reformed Faith,” according to Allyn Russell (“J. Gresham Machen Scholarly Fundamentalist” Journal of Presbyterian History 51 [1973]: 49).
3. H. L. Mencken, “Doctor Fundamentalis,” The Evening Sun ( January 18, 1937). It is worthwhile to note that Mencken’s high esteem of Machen must be viewed as exceptional considering the fact that Mencken rejected Fundamentalism. Cf. Tom Bisset, “Baltimore’s Late, Great Evangelical Superstar,” Baltimore Sun (September 10, 1978).
4. John Murray, “Dr. J. Gresham Machen,” The Covenanter Witness (February 10, 1937): 83.
5. Sydney E. Ahlstrom, “The Continental Influence on American Christian Thought since World War I,” CH 27 (1958): 258.
6. See Terry A. Chrisope, Toward a Sure Faith: And the Dilemma of Biblical Criticism, 1881–1915 (Fearn: Christian Focus Publishing, 2000), 18–19.
7. It is worth noting here, as Mark Noll has pointed out, that in America between 1900–1935 the number of Fundamentalist scholars engaged in biblical study declined. Noll attributes this decline to several elements: “the loss of institutional bases within the older dominations, a shrinking corps of active Bible scholars, the spread of dispensationalism, the ascendance of activism, the distrust of university, the disruption of the fundamentalist-modernist controversies.” Nevertheless, Noll shows clearly that orthodox scholars at Princeton Theological Seminary and Westminster Theological Seminary cannot be placed in the same category; their conservative scholarship proceeded in the engagement of contemporary issues via vital scholarly work. See Mark Noll, Between Faith and Criticism: Evangelicals, Scholarship, and the Bible in America (New York: Harper and Row, 1986), 60–61. Similarly, George Wright points out that “one of the chief characteristics of American fundamentalism of the twentieth century has been the steady decline of its scholarly work. The fundamentalist atmosphere of largely negative reaction has evidently not been conductive to the production of brilliant, flexible, highly trained, sensitive and scholarly minds.” George E. Wright, “The Study of the Old Testament,” in Protestant Thought in the Twentieth Century: Whence and Whither (ed. Arnold S. Nash; New York: Macmillan, 1951), 20.
8. George M. Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Evangelicalism 1870–1925 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1980), 51.
9. Nathan O. Hatch and Mark A. Noll, The Bible in America: Essays in Cultural History (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982), 87.
10. Ira V. Brown, “The Higher Criticism comes to America, 1880–1900,” The Journal of Presbyterian History 38 (1960): 193.
11. Ibid. Science was responsible for the dismissal of “supernaturalism” and placed in its position the idea of the “continuation between nature, man, and God.” Kenneth Cauthen, The Impact of American Religious Liberalism (New York: Harper and Row, 1962), 7.
12. Jürgen Herbst, The German Historical School in American Scholarship (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1965), 8.
13. See Richard L. Christensen, The Ecumenical Orthodoxy of Charles Augustine Briggs (1841–1913) (Lewiston: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1995), 2; and J. Gordon Melton, “J. Gresham Machen,” in Religious Leaders of America (ed. J. Gordon Melton; Farmington Hills: The Gale Group, 1999), 78.
14. Lloyd J. Averill, American Theology in the Liberal Tradition (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1967), 82. Sydney E. Ahlstrom, Theology in America: The Major Protestant Voices from Puritanism to Neo- Orthodoxy (New York: Boobs-Merrill, 1967), 531.
15. William R. Hutchison, The Modernist Impulse in American Protestantism (Durham: Duke University Press, 1992), 3.
16. Deane W. Ferm, Contemporary American Theologies: A Critical Survey (New York: Seabury Press, 1981), 7.
17. Bradley J. Longfield, The Presbyterian Controversy: Fundamentalists, Modernists and Moderates (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 19.
18. Allyn Russell, Voices of American Fundamentalism: Seven Biographical Studies (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1976), 179.
19. Daniel G. Reid et al., eds., “The Fundamentals” in Concise Dictionary of Christianity in America (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1995), 140. R. A. Torrey and A. C. Dixon, The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth (4 vols.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1970). It may be noted with Noll that the scholarly world gave little recognition to the claims made in The Fundamentals (Noll, Between Faith and Criticism, 44). At this point it is interesting to compare the attention that Machen received in contrast to The Fundamentals. Machen received attention from such men as Mencken and Walter Lippmann. Lippmann, for example, praised Machen’s book Christianity and Liberalism, saying “it is an admirable book” (A Preface to Morals [New York: Macmillan, 1929], 32). Not only was he recognized by Americans, but also was read and acknowledged by European scholars. In Die Geschichte der synoptischen Tradition, Rudolf Bultmann referred to Machen’s work The Virgin Birth of Christ, p. 138, admitting readily that Machen stresses very well the relationship between Luke 1:34ff. and vv. 36ff. (Die Geschichte der synoptischen Tradition [4th ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1958], 322). Adolf von Harnack also voiced his opinion with respect to Machen’s article “The Hymns of the first Chapter of Luke and the Origin of the first two Chapters of Luke” (Princeton Theological Review 10 [1912]: 1-38, 212–77). Harnack welcomes Machen’s thorough discussion and remarks that this study deserves attention in Review of “The Hymns of the first Chapter of Luke and the Origin of the first two Chapters of Luke,” by J. Gresham Machen in Theologische Literaturzeitung 38 (1913): 7. It is interesting to observe these responses to Machen by liberal scholars in contrast to Fundamentalists. Tom Bisset points out that, for example, The Origin of Paul’s Religion was too scholarly for the public, and “the fundamentalists, never bothered to read it” (“Baltimore’s Late, Great Evangelical Superstar” [September 10, 1978]).
20. Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture, 176. Notice also that for Shailer Mathews Christianity did not deal with “doctrine” but with “life.” Ibid., 177. In fact, he said Christianity “is a moral and spiritual movement, born of the experiences of God known through Jesus Christ as Savior” (The Faith of Modernism [New York: Macmillan, 1924], cited by George M. Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture, 177). On the other side were such men as Shirley J. Case, who emphasized highly the study of “modern historical religion” in order to provide release from the captivity to antiquity as a model “for modern living” (“The Historical Study of Religion,” JR 1 [1921]: 15).
21. Harrisville and Sundberg, The Bible in Modern Culture, 189.
22. John R. Muether, “Machen: The Vision of Faithful Scholarship,” The Reformed Herald 42, no. 7 (1987): 12.
23. As already noted, for example, William Jennings Bryan is well known for his actions against liberalism. Yet as Marsden rightly points out, Bryan’s apology for the Christian faith was in essence “pragmatic” and was based on his understanding of society. Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture, 134. Nevertheless, Fundamentalists, in contrast to Machen, while noticing the abandonment of conservative views regarding Christianity, expressed an unfriendly attitude towards intellectual thinkers. Critical scholars believed that the conservatives were anti-academic. Darryl G. Hart, “ ‘Doctor Fundamentalis’: An Intellectual Biography of J. Gresham Machen, 1881–1937” (Ph.D. diss., John Hopkins University, 1988), 16.
24. D. Clair Davis, “Machen and Liberalism,” in Pressing Toward the Mark: Essays Commemorating Fifty Years of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (ed. Charles G. Dennison and Richard C. Gamble; Philadelphia: The Committee for the Historian of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, 1986), 248.
25. J. Gresham Machen, The Importance of Christian Scholarship (London: The Bible League, 1932), 26. Likewise Machen stressed that argumentation ought to be done in a scholarly manner. Additionally, it is to be taken into account that Machen in his arguments against his adversaries did not abandon a polemic way of putting forth his arguments. The Zeitgeist of Machen’s day reflected an opposition to polemic that was signified by decline, yet for Machen “the New Testament is full of polemics almost from the beginning to the end.” See J. Gresham Machen to Geo. Lillegard, 14 April 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
26. Machen’s biographer, Ned Stonehouse, notes that Machen’s meeting with Wilhelm Herrmann “was responsible for one of the most overwhelming intellectual and religious experiences of his life, an experience which, though not the instrument of initiating indecision and doubt, seems to have been chiefly responsible for prolonging and intensifying his religious struggle” (Stonehouse, J. Gresham Machen, 105). In “Christianity in Conflict” Machen describes the anguishes that he experienced in Germany. In this environment the Christian faith had been forsaken long ago; therefore, Machen concluded that it was impossible for a believer to be in such a position without having critical doubts. See J. Gresham Machen, “Christianity in Conflict,” 261. Moreover, in a letter to Edward Rian, Machen mentioned that there was a “great struggle” in his time in Germany. See Machen to Edward Rian, 31 October 1927, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
27. Terry A. Chrisope, “The Bible and Historical Scholarship in the Early Life and Thought of J. Gresham Machen, 1881–1915” (Ph.D. diss., Kansas State University, 1988), 143.
28. Ibid.
29. Terry Chrisope interprets Machen’s crisis as a critical developmental moment of his life, from which his more “mature” thoughts of the Bible, historical study and the essence of Christianity originate (Chrisope, “The Bible and Historical Scholarship,” 143).Wayne Headman points out that the main question with which Machen grappled in Germany was “Is Christianity true or not?” The answer to this and other questions established some essential views which he maintained throughout his lifetime. See Headman, “A Critical Evaluation of J. Gresham Machen” (Th.M. thesis, Princeton Theological Seminary, 1974), 20.
30. W. Stanford Reid, “J. Gresham Machen,” in The Princeton Theology (ed. David Wells; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1989), 96.
31. Ferm, Contemporary American Theologies, 11. Because space will not allow a full elaboration of the Fundamentalists’ approach to the Bible, it may be helpful to mention a few examples viewed as distinct from Machen’s method. It was common among Fundamentalists to interpret the Old and New Testament through the studies of words as it was done by Donald G. Barnhouse. While he interpreted a text, he would diagram important words through the whole Bible, e.g., Exposition of Bible Dictionary (10 vols., 1952–1963). Cyril J. Barber and Robert Krauss, An Introduction to Theological Research (2d ed.; New York: University Press of America, 2000), 76. One of the most common methods of interpretation of the Bible was James M. Gray’s “synthetic method.” The aim of this method was to bring the contents of the Bible together instead of separating them. Additionally, William Evans was an advocate of the “book-method of Bible study,” meaning the reader covers each book at once, and rereads it prayerfully without exterior aid. See Hatch and Noll, The Bible in America, 112.
32. Machen, “Christianity in Conflict,” 251–52.
33. Ibid., 252. In Machen’s words, “It seemed significant to me then, as it seems today, that, applying such modern methods of criticism to the New Testament, he [Armstrong] could arrive at a result confirmatory, and not destructive, of the trustworthiness of the New Testament” (253).
34. Darryl G. Hart, “J. Gresham Machen,” in Historical Handbook of Major Biblical Interpreters (ed. Donald K. McKim; Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1998), 595. The doctrine of concursus views the Bible as both human and divine. For further reading on the doctrine of concursus see, e.g., Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1999), 1:598–605.
35. Noll, Between Faith and Criticism, 55. Dallas M. Roark seems to make a useful point by saying that Machen was not challenging the “methods of higher criticism,” but rather their presuppositions and results (“J. Gresham Machen and His Desire to Maintain a Doctrinally True Presbyterian Church” [Ph.D. diss., State University of Iowa, 1963], 82). William Masselink in his dissertation discusses the “Modernistic movements” that Machen opposed. While doing so he pays attention to Machen’s critique, but he misses completely that Machen also had something positive to say about his adversaries. See Masselink’s “Professor J. Gresham Machen His Life and Defence of the Bible” (Th.D. diss., Free University of Amsterdam, 1938), 31–39.
36. J. Gresham Machen, “Is Christianity True?” The Bible Today 17 (1923): 198.
37. Ibid.
38. J. Gresham Machen, “TheWitness of the Gospels,” in What is Christianity? And Other Addresses (ed. Ned B. Stonehouse; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1951), 58.
39. Machen, “Is Christianity True?” 198.
40. J. Gresham Machen, “Christianity vs. Modern Liberalism,” Moody Monthly 23 (1923): 349.
41. Louis Berkhof, Principles of Biblical Interpretation (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1950), 32.
42. J. Gresham Machen, “History and Faith,” in What Is Christianity?, 176.
43. J. Gresham Machen, Christianity and Liberalism (New York: Macmillan, 1923), 99.
44. J. Gresham Machen, “Religion and Fact,” The Real Issue 1, no. 3 (1924): 3-6. John Draper in his History of the Conflict of Religion and Science [1873] should here be noted as an advocate of the idea that science and religion were not in harmony since religion claimed its authority by the “institutionalized Church.” In contrast science’s goal was to shatter the Church’s pretensions to authority by revealing that all institutions of religion are derived from mortal sources. Edward A. White, Science and Religion and American Thought (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1952), 2.
45. R. Mackay to Machen, 7 March 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
46. J. Gresham Machen, “Modernism and the Faith,” Letter from Professor Gresham Machen The British Weekly (September 11, 1924): 74. Elsewhere Machen notes that “a generation or so ago that feature of scientific method was exalted to the dignity of a principle.” J. Gresham Machen, What is Faith? (1925; repr., Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1962), 24. The aim of the “grammatico historical exegesis” lies in the distinction between what the modern scholar would wish the author would have said and the intention of the original author. Ibid.
47. Darryl G. Hart, “The Princeton Mind in the Modern World and the Common Sense of J. Gresham Machen,” WTJ 46 (1984): 8, 12.
48. Harry E. Fosdick, The Modern Use of the Bible (New York: Macmillian, 1925), 36.
49. Machen, “The Modern Use of the Bible,” in What is Christianity?, 187.
50. Harry E. Fosdick, Christianity and Progress (New York: Revell, 1922), 128–36.
51. Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture, 176.
52. Darryl G. Hart, Defending the Faith: J. Gresham Machen and the Crisis of Conservative Protestantism in Modern America (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994), 91. Dr. Hart points out that when Machen speaks of science he identified it frequently with “systematic inquiry and organized learning” (Defending the Faith, 93). It is perhaps worth noting here that Dispensationalists believed that their system of separating and categorizing was the only “scientific method” (see Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture, 60). Classic dispensationalism in its hermeneutical method aims to separate Scripture correctly into various stages and divine enterprises and afterwards rejoins them in a difficult practice (Hatch and Noll, The Bible in America, 114).
53. Machen, What is Faith?, 24.
54. Ibid., 241.
55. J. Gresham Machen, The Christian Faith in the Modern World (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1936), 62.
56. Ibid., 63.
57. Ibid. Charles Hodge makes a similar point as does Machen by stressing the authority of facts, saying that the interpreter of Scripture must interpret it in agreement with instituted facts (Systematic Theology, 1:57).
58. Machen, “Religion and Fact,” 3–6.
59. J. Gresham Machen, “The Relation of Religion to Science and Philosophy,” Princeton Theological Review 24 (1926): 50.
60. Ibid., 52.
61. Machen, The Christian Faith, 65.
62. J. Gresham Machen, “God’s Works of Providence,” in The Christian View of Man (1937; repr., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1999), 98.
63. Machen, What is Faith? 242.
64. J. Gresham Machen, The Virgin Birth of Christ (1930; repr., New York: Harper and Brothers, 1932), 219.
65. Machen, “Christianity and Culture,” in What is Christianity?, 160.
66. Machen, “Christianity and Culture,” 160.
67. Ibid.
68. Ibid., 163.
69. Ibid., 164.
70. Certainly Machen did not alter this conclusion. See Douglas Jacobsen, “From Truth to Authority to Responsibility: The Shifting Focus of Evangelical Hermeneutics, 1915–1986,” in Theological Themes in the American Protestant World (Modern American Protestantism and its World 4; ed. Martin E. Marty; Munich: K. G. Saur, 1992), 376.
71. See Hart, “Princeton Mind,” 10.
72. Grant Wacker, Augustus H. Strong and the Dilemma of Historical Consciousness (Macon: Mercer University Press, 1985), 22.
73. George M. Marsden, “J. Gresham Machen, History, and Truth,” WTJ 42 (1979): 159.
74. Chrisope, Toward a Sure Faith, 18.
75. Ned B. Stonehouse, introduction to What is Christianity?, 11.
76. Machen, “History and Faith,” 170.
77. Ibid.
78. J. Gresham Machen, A Rapid Survey of the Literature and History of New Testament Times, Teachers Manual (The Westminster Departmental Graded Series; ed. JohnT. Faris; Philadelphia: The Presbyterian Board of Christian Education, 1914), 3.
79. J. Gresham Machen, The New Testament: An Introduction to its Literature and History (Carlisle: Banner of Truth, 1976), 17.
80. Machen, What is Faith?, 40.
81. Ibid., 46.
82. Martin Rumscheidt, Introduction to Adolf vonHarnack: LiberalTheology at its Height (The Making of Modern Theology; ed. Martin Rumscheidt; London: Collins, 1989), 63.
83. Rumscheidt, “Introduction,” 42. For Harnack it is clear that there is something very solid in history that provides important facts that cannot be disputed. Adolf von Harnack, “What Has History to Offer?” in Adolf von Harnack, 48.
84. Machen, “The Modern Use of the Bible,” 191.
85. Ibid., 192.
86. Machen, “The Witness of the Gospels,” 60.
87. Machen, “What is Christianity?” in What is Christianity?, 22.
88. Von Harnack, “Christianity and History,” in Adolf von Harnack, 65. Likewise, von Harnack concluded a fact relevant in the first century is irrelevant today because of the progress of science is an unreasonable assertion.
89. Machen, “History and Faith,” 171.
90. Ibid.
91. Ibid.
92. Machen, What is Faith?, 130.
93. Machen, “The Relation of Religion to Science and Philosophy,” 42.
94. Ibid.
95. Ibid., 43.
96. Machen, “The Modern Use of the Bible,” 196.
97. Dennis N. Voskuil, “America Encounters Karl Barth, 1919–1939,” in Theological Themes, 256. In 1928 Douglas Horton provided the first translation of Karl Barth’s work Das Wort Gottes und die Theologie (ibid., 255). Elmer Homrighausen suggests that Americans did not readily receive Barth’s theology of crisis, since nobody in America encountered the affliction that Europeans had to suffer. See Elmer G. Homrighausen, “Barth and the American Theological Scene,” Union Seminary Review 46 (1934-35): 289, 291.
98. A correlation between Machen’s assessment of Neo-orthodoxy and the review of some other American scholars will be helpful in our study. We should note how some other theologians made similar observations as Machen in the analysis of Karl Barth. According to Rolston, in the early thirties two books appeared that criticized Barthianism: Alvin S. Zerbe, The Karl Barth Theology: Or the New Transcendentalism (Cleveland: Central Publishing House, 1930), and Wilhelm Pauck, Karl Barth: Prophet of a New Christianity? (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1931). See Holmes Rolston, A Conservative Looks to Barth and Brunner (Nashville: Cokesbury Press, 1933), 207. Zerbe, an orthodox Calvinist, penned the first book evaluation of Barthiansim (see Voskuil “America Encounters Karl Barth,” 257). Besides these critical works by Zerbe and Pauck three appreciative books towards Barthianism emerged: Birch Hoyle, The Teaching of Karl Barth; John McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth; and J. A. Chapman, The Theology of Karl Barth.
99. In a letter to Stonehouse on 25 February 1928, Machen writes that “my own acquaintance with the Barthian movement is very much more limited than it would be if we had not been kept during this year in such a constant disturbance at Princeton as to prevent real intellectual labor in our own field” (Machen to Stonehouse, 25 February 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.). Almost one year later, Machen received a letter from Dr. Horton asking him for help regarding who could write a review of the just published work by Karl Barth Das Wort Gottes und die Theologie. Machen did not take on the task to review the book, but he referred toDr. Hodge as a competent man for a review (Dr. Douglas Horton to Machen, 11 March 1929, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.).
100. Ibid. It is worth noting here that Brunner himself was informed about Machen; and in fact, he praised Machen’s work highly (Horton to Machen, 11 March 1929). Machen himself had the privilege to meet with Brunner at Princeton, having a lengthy personal discussion with him (Machen to Corum, 18 July 1931, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.).
101. Terry A. Chrisope, “J. Gresham Machen on Barthianism,” The Banner of Truth 330 (1991): 17.
102. Albert Knudsen, “German Fundamentalism,” The Christian Century 45 ( June 14, 1928): 762.
103. J. Gresham Machen, “Karl Barth and the ‘Theology of Crisis’,” 23 April 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
104. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 2.
105. Ibid.
106. A further point ought to be noted here, in that both men were students of Wilhelm Herrmann. Initially Machen was greatly impressed by Wilhelm Herrmann’s views, yet later he rejected his theology and discerned that the Christ of Herrmann did in reality never exist. Stonehouse, J. Gresham Machen, 106–8. “We must experience the personal life of Jesus as a real power,” stated Herrmann. Wilhelm Herrmann, Der Verkehr des Christen mit Gott (Stuttgart: Union Deutsche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1908), 62.Machen was certain that revelation is objective and not an experience (Roark, “J. Gresham Machen,” 76). It is to be noted that in his early career Barth stressed in his sermons “life” or “experience” ( Jack B. Rogers and Donald McKim, The Authority and Interpretation of the Bible: An Historical Approach [San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1979], 408). In 1920 Barth indicated that when he came to Marburg he was already a convinced Marburger, but in the course of time he distanced himself from Herrmann. See Karl Barth, Die Theologie und die Kirche (Zürich: Evangelischer Verlag, 1920), 240–41. Berkhof noted that soon Barth definitely turned against the school of Herrmann and established his theology on the foundation of “the unabrogable subjectivity of God.” See Hendrikus Berkhof, Two Hundred Years of Theology: Report of a Personal Journey (trans. John Vriend; 1985; repr., Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992), 200–201. Barth clearly disagreed with Herrmann’s attempt to establish theology on “experience” (Theologie und Kirche, 199). It is inconceivable to obtain the existence of God from “religious experience and its object” (ibid.). As a result, both Machen and Barth dismissed Herrmann’s subjectivism.
107. Woolley to Machen, 20 July 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa. Harrisville and Sundberg are indeed correct when stating that both Barth and Machen’s critique was an attack against an “entire movement” (Harrisville and Sundberg, The Bible in Modern Culture, 200). Yet it must be remembered that one of Barth’s critiques of liberal theology rested on the fact that liberals attempted to apply “the scientific examination” to the data on which Christianity is established. See Wilhelm Pauck, Karl Barth: A Prophet of a New Christianity?, 43.
108. Not only was Karl Barth influenced by Luther and Calvin, but he took hold of the dialectic of Sören Kierkegaard. See John McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth (New York: Richard R. Smith, 1931), 26.
109. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 2. McConnachie in Significance of Karl Barth also observes a turn in the history of the church, noting positively that the coming of Karl Barth at this gloomy junction of the history of the church can only be interpreted as an act of God to help this present generation (McConnachie cited by Rolston, A Conservative Looks to Barth and Brunner, 17).
110. Yet Modern Liberalism is not always “pantheistic,” but it makes the attempt to erase the creator and creature distinction. See Machen, “Christianity vs. Modern Liberalism,” 350.
111. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 16.
112. Machen, “Christianity vs. Modern Liberalism,” 351.
113. Hart, “‘Doctor Fundamentalis,’” 75.
114. Rolston, A Conservative Looks to Barth and Brunner, 102.
115. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 17. Yet as it is unfolded in this study, Machen cannot agree with Barth’s notion of history.
116. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 3.
117. Ibid.
118. John Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion (trans. Henry Beveridge; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995), 1.1.1. Jenkins shows how Barth differs clearly from Calvin and the early Fathers in his dualism. F. D. Jenkins, “Germany’s New Paradox Theology,” BSac 83 (1926): 436.
119. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 3.
120. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 251.
121. Karl Barth, Der Römerbrief (Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1926), 169.
122. Fosdick, Modern Use of the Bible, 266.
123. J. Gresham Machen, Christianity and Liberalism (New York: Macmillan, 1923; repr., Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), 117–56.
124. Ibid., 64-65.
125. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 5. To compare Barth to Machen, one of Machen’s sermons reads that “we are unworthy to lift our eyes unto God. But as we shrink in guilty fear from these high things, God has put forth His hand to draw us near. He has come in the Person of the Son and borne our guilt.” Hence, the frightful “curtain” between God and men was raised by revelation which finds its meaning in an “act of love.” J. Gresham Machen, “God Transcendent,” in God Transcendent (ed. Ned B. Stonehouse; 1949; repr., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1982), 20.
126. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 249. Barth went to the other extreme, God is not manifested “in the heart of man” neither “in human nature.” Hutchison, The Modernist Impulse in American Protestantism, 293.
127. Machen, “God Transcendent,” 18–19.
128. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 254.
129. Ibid.
130. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 5.
131. Machen, Christianity and Liberalism, 131.
132. J. Gresham Machen, The Christian View of Man (1937; repr., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1999), 222.
133. Machen, What is Faith?, 58.
134. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 7. In Der Römerbrief Barth defined “faith” as being silent and to worship in ignorance [“nicht-wissen”] (Karl Barth, Der Römerbrief, 182).
135. Pauck, Karl Barth, 124.
136. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 6.
137. Machen to Stonehouse, 25 February 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
138. Machen, The Virgin Birth, 218.
139. Ibid. Keeping in mind that Machen published the first edition of The Virgin Birth in 1930, it may be the case that while making this statement he had in mind the Barthian teaching.
140. Karl Barth, Das Wort Gottes und die Theologie (Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1925), 96.
141. Ibid.
142. Rolston, A Conservative Looks to Barth and Brunner, 189. When Barth remarks that the resurrection is unhistorical, the word “historical” denotes a different meaning, whereby the resurrection is part of God’s world and “it is in history but it is not of history” (196). Barth admits that God operates in history; nonetheless, history does not take part in revelation. Berkhof, Two Hundred Years of Theology, 214.
143. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 37.
144. Pauck, Karl Barth, 123.
145. Zerbe, Karl Barth Theology, 77.
146. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 8.
147. J. Gresham Machen, “Forty Years of New Testament Research,” Union Seminary Review 11 (October 1928): 10.
148. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 9.
149. Ibid., 10.
150. See Machen, Christianity and Liberalism, 21.
151. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 12.
152. Ibid., 10.
153. Barth, Das Wort Gottes und die Theologie, 84.
154. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 254.
155. Ibid.
156. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 9. It is important to see how Caspar Hodge reacted to Machen’s assessment. He avoided Machen’s criticism of history and focused on the “philosophical foundations of Barthian’s epistemology.” In contrast to Machen, Hodge believed that Barth’s view would not change regarding this historicity of the Bible because of his “epistemological implications.” See Darryl G. Hart, “Machen on Barth,” WTJ 53 (1991): 193-94. Edwin Rian was in his interpretation closer to Machen. He believed that the theology of Barthianism is in two points distinct from the view of old Princeton: (1) regarding the authority of Scripture and (2) regarding the notion of history. For him the establishment of the Christian religion is eradicated by the Barthian’s view of history. See Edward H. Rian, The Presbyterian Conflict (Philadelphia: The Committee for the Historian of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, 1940), 52–53.
157. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 11.
158. Ibid., 11-12.
159. Jenkins, “Germany’s New Paradox Theology,” 438.
160. Machen to Corum, 16 July 1931, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa. William Robinson, in his critical evaluation, points out that the first problem is the “doctrine of divine inspiration” and the second is related to the doctrine of redemption. William C. Robinson, “The Theology of Karl Barth a Protest and a Standpoint,” Union Seminary Review 40 (1928–29): 121. This evaluation by Robinson clearly reflects a Fundamentalist critique of Karl Barth. It must be borne in mind that in Christianity and Liberalism Machen did not critique “the doctrine of divine inspiration” as the first weak element in Modern Liberalism (see 72–79).
161. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 12.
162. Ibid., 13. Jenkins in his interpretation of Barth makes a similar observation, Jesus as “true divine reality” is not historical; for Barth, Paul provided the super-historical connotation of Christ that the Synoptics completely lack. Jenkins, “Germany’s New Paradox Theology,” 459.
163. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 255.
164. Machen to Corum, 16 July 1931, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
165. Zerbe, Karl Barth Theology, 131.
166. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 13.
167. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 14. Barth attacked the entire idea of “history” that was linked with the “historical method,” asserting that the interpretation of Scripture must begin with “faith.” Rogers and McKim, The Authority and Interpretation of the Bible, 424. For Barth the initial meaning to the first readers did not matter; it was more essential to relate the text to the present context of modern man. In Barth’s exegetical task the Bible ought to be understood as God’s word and not “as a collection of human documents.” See Werner B. Kümmel, The New Testament: The History of the Investigation of its Problems (trans. Howard Clark Kee; New York: Abingdon Press, 1970), 363.
168. Jenkins, “Germany’s New Paradox Theology,” 428. Likewise his former instructor Adolf Schlatter [a positive theologian] remarked that it is inconceivable that “a scholar” would belittle “scientific exegetical procedures.” See Rogers and McKim, The Authority and Interpretation of the Bible, 410. It is perhaps worthy to pay notice to von Harnack’s and Barth’s correspondence regarding this whole debate. Von Harnack himself provided fifteen questions forKarl Barth, whom he considered as the “despiser of scientific theology” (see his “Revelation and Theology: The Barth-Harnack Correspondence,” in Adolf von Harnack, 85). Viewing this correspondence clarifies more of Barth’s problematic views, as Machen himself definitely observed. In his fourteenth question von Harnack asked Barth, “If the person of Jesus Christ stands at the center of the gospel, how else can the basis for reliable and communal knowledge of this person be gained but through critical-historical study so that an imagined Christ is not put in the place of a real one? What else besides scientific theology is able to undertake this study?” (ibid., 87). Barth in his reply to von Harnack articulated clearly that the Verstehen [Understanding] of the Bible is not to be apprehended by “historical knowledge and critical reflection,” but rather by the “virtue of that Spirit which is identical with the content of the Bible and that by faith” (ibid., 88). In contrast to Barth, von Harnack believed that the assignment of theology is in agreement with the assignment of science (ibid., 91). Here we may note that Machen is closer to von Harnack’s view in his relation to science and history.
169. Woolley to Machen, 20 July 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
170. Machen to Woolley, 16 July 1928, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
171. Machen, “Forty Years of New Testament Research,” 10.
172. Ibid., 10. In his introduction to Der Römerbrief Barth notes that the whole summa of the Bible is for him the relationship of God to man (Barth, Der Römerbrief, 13).
173. Machen to Corum, 18 July 1931. This letter reveals clearly that Machen by 1931 had read several works by Karl Barth and two works by Emil Brunner.
174. Machen to Corum, 18 July 1931.
175. Regarding transcendence, Machen declared that there “are two great presuppositions of everything else that the Bible contains; the two great presuppositions are the transcendent God and the guilt and misery of man in his sin.” Machen, The Importance of Christian Scholarship, 39. Machen had a high view of the notion of the transcendent God, yet I don’t suggest that Machen’s notion of transcendence is analogous to Barth’s. In Barth’s notion God has become so transcendent that there is no difference for human beings if he is present or not. Halford Luccok, “Reconstruction,” in American Protestant Thought in the Liberal Era (ed. William R. Hutchison; Lanham: University Press of America, 1968), 202. For Machen “the transcendence of God, what the Bible calls the “holiness” of God—is at the foundation of Christian faith.” (What is Faith? 65).
176. Machen to Corum, 18 July 1931.
177. Ibid.
178. Zerbe, Karl Barth Theology, 270.
179. Machen to Caspar W. Hodge, 18 February 1936, Machen Archives, Montgomery Library, Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, Pa.
180. Machen, “Karl Barth,” 17.
181. McConnachie, The Significance of Karl Barth, 254.
182. Rolston, A Conservative Looks to Barth and Brunner, 200.
183. Ibid., 201.
184. Calvin states in his Institutes clearly that “faith rests on knowledge.” See John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (ed. John T. McNeill; trans. Ford Lewis Battles; London: S.C.M. Press, 1960), 3.2.2.
185. J. Gresham Machen cited by Russell, J. Gresham Machen Scholarly Fundamentalist, 46.
186. Machen, “Christianity in Conflict,” 266. Machen here refers to his earlier work The Origin of Paul’s Religion (1921).
187. In fact, this was one of the purposes for which Machen founded Westminster Theological Seminary, viz., “that the Christian religion as so set forth requires and is capable of scholarly defence” (ibid., 270).