Benjamin B. Warfield And True Church Unity

By Jeffrey A. Stivason

[Jeffrey A. Stivason is pastor of Grace Reformed Presbyterian Church in Gibsonia, PA.]

Abstract

This article examines Benjamin B. Warfield’s view of church unity. Though the research explores the entire corpus of Warfield’s body of work, the primary exploration encompasses the exegesis of two articles that are almost identical and yet separated by fourteen years, “True Church Unity: What It Is,” and “Christian Unity and Church Union; Some Primary Principles.” The teaching of these writings substantiate the following claim: the progressive and constructive nature of Warfield’s understanding of theology requires the existence of denominations. The article proceeds in the following manner. First, the research focuses on Warfield’s understanding of what church unity was not according to the apostolic church. Second, having understood the unity in the negative, the article moves on to observe the ground and nature of ecclesiastical unity in the apostolic church as understood by Warfield. The third point explores the progressive and constructive nature of systematic theology and how it applies to Warfield’s understanding of ecclesiastical unity. In this point, the idea of unity and the legitimacy of denominational separation is explored and substantiated from Warfield’s perspective. The fourth and final point gives attention to the minimalism that has the power to eclipse the church’s visible unity. In particular, the failure to engage in theological inquiry grounded upon the Scriptures will hinder and even destroy the unity of the church.

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David P. Smith reminds us in his helpful book B. B. Warfield’s Scientifically Constructive Theological Scholarship that Warfield wrote a staggering amount, and that to value and appreciate the nature of his scholarship one must read widely in it.[1] This is especially true with regard to topics like revelation, Christology, and even apologetics, but there were topics in Warfield’s corpus which were not so frequently visited by his prolific pen, ecclesiology among them. In fact, Fred G. Zaspel argues, “Warfield nowhere elaborates at length on the nature of the church, but he does make reference to it in several places, highlighting his leading concerns.”[2] Surely one of his leading concerns was the unity of the church.

Likely among the constellation of reasons for his concern for this aspect of ecclesiology one in particular may be obvious to the person who knows something about Warfield’s denomination, the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (USA). The Presbyterian Church as a denomination was no stranger to division, union, and even reunion, and so it is little wonder that when Warfield’s powerful intellect migrated toward the loci of ecclesiology, he thought of the church’s unity.

As a matter of fact, Warfield twice sketched his view of the church’s unity, once in the December 1890 edition of The Homiletic Review and fourteen years later in the June 1904/1905 edition of The Presbyterian Banner. Of course, these are not the only articles wherein Warfield touched upon ecclesiology, but they are primary with regard to the topic of unity.

In fact, these articles, separated by fourteen years, have a way of bringing some clarity to Warfield’s thinking on the subject of ecclesiastical unity. Reading them consecutively, one immediately notices that the latter article borrows extensively from the former, and while each strikes its own chord both have the same baseline. What is more, both articles emerge in the context of church strife and yet both reveal an obvious concern for her peace and unity.

For example, Warfield’s 1890 article, “True Church Unity: What It Is,” was penned during a tumultuous period in the Presbyterian Church.[3] In 1888 the Princeton Seminary faculty had elected Warfield to replace Francis Patton as co-editor of The Presbyterian Review to serve alongside Charles A. Briggs. By 1890, however, tension between Warfield and Briggs was high.

Briggs, for many reasons, had not endeared himself to Warfield, not the least of which was the publication of his 1889 book Whither? A Theological Question for the Times. Therein Briggs accused A. A. Hodge and Warfield of making their private opinions concerning inspiration the official doctrine of the church.[4] Several pages later Briggs could not contain his acerbity. He went so far as to describe the dogmatic opinions of Hodge and Warfield as “false doctrine circulating in a tract bearing the imprint of the Presbyterian Board of Publication, among our ministers and people, poisoning their souls and misleading them into dangerous error.”[5] In fact, rounded off Briggs, “No more dangerous doctrine has ever come from the pen of men.”[6]

It seems that working together was difficult, and disagreements were the staple of their relationship. So it is little wonder that in 1889, a year after being elected co-editor, Warfield clashed with Briggs yet again, this time over the procedure for discussing the issue of creedal revision, which had been proposed by the General Assembly of 1889.[7] One can see how much Warfield disliked the idea of the revision put forward by the 1889 General Assembly in his summary of the 1890 General Assembly. He wrote,

The great unwisdom of the Assembly of 1889 in sending down its sweeping overture—an unwisdom which was early demonstrated by the opportunity taken under it by some who, while in the Presbyterian Church are not of it, to attack the very citadel of our creed—has been, it is hoped, largely neutralized by the wisdom of the Assembly of 1890 in proceeding to attempt the desired revision under the safe-guard which confines it within the limits of “the Reformed or Calvinistic system of doctrine taught in the Confession of Faith.”[8]

In October of that same year Warfield resigned as co-editor, and the faculty of Union Seminary recommended the discontinuance of the Review.[9]

The second article, published in 1904, was titled “Christian Unity and Church Union; Some Preliminary Principles” and was, in some ways, published in a very different period of time.[10] By 1904 Charles Briggs (not to mention Smith and McGiffert) was gone, and it looked as if the church would enjoy some level of peace.[11]

By the turn of the century, however, the Presbyterian Church was becoming an organizational machine that was slowly but surely losing sight of its role as God’s instrument for the preservation of the truth and his engine for propagating it in the world.[12] The byproduct of this identity crisis was to interpret the standards of the church broadly enough to house all who wished to be welcomed into the machine of the Presbyterian Church. One historian even quipped that the Presbyterian Church made a practice of entering into ecclesiastical union “not by resolving its differences, but by ignoring and absorbing them.”[13] This included doctrinal differences.

Such was the prevailing attitude of the Presbyterian Church when it formally united with the Cumberland Presbyterian Church after having been divided since 1810. Warfield seems to have taken a special interest in this particular attempt at union. Not only did he write his article on unity and union for The Presbyterian Banner at this time, but additionally he penned editorials for The Cumberland Presbyterian; an ecclesiastical note, some twenty pages in length, commenting on the proposal for union for The Princeton Theological Review; and two articles for The Presbyterian, one of which was titled “The Vote of the Cumberland Presbyterian Union.” Interestingly, Warfield signed this article with the initials N.E.D., the last letter of each of his three names.

Therefore, despite the limited amount of material concerning the nature of the church in Warfield’s corpus, we will focus on a topic that was apparently dear to the heart of the Princeton theologian, the unity of the church. In so doing, we will draw on the entire corpus, but our primary work will encompass the exegesis of “True Church Unity: What It Is,” and “Christian Unity and Church Union; Some Primary Principles” in order to substantiate the following claim: Warfield believed that since the visible church is grounded upon truth, visible ecclesiastical unity requires the existence of denominations.

The direction of our research will take the following shape. First, we will clear the playing field by focusing on what church unity is not. Second, having understood the negative, we will examine the ground and nature of ecclesiastical unity. Third, we will explore the progressive and constructive nature of systematic theology and how it applies to Warfield’s ecclesiastical unity. And fourth, we will give our attention to the minimalism that has the power to destroy the church’s visible unity.

I. What Ecclesiastical Union Is Not

Warfield’s keen scientific mind seemed naturally adept at analytical and categorical exploration; he was always observing, assessing, and then offering conclusions on the basis of his usually thorough examinations.[14] For the Kentucky farm boy, a theological diagnosis of a spiritual malady was no different from observing and assessing other pathologies. As a result, Warfield understood the problems that could arise from the over-emphasis of one aspect of a system as opposed to another; in this case, the empirical unity of the church was tending to eclipse the spiritual origin and nature of the church, which provided its best and only ground for unity. In fact, Warfield had observed something similar while studying Augustine.

According to Warfield, Augustine had attempted to wed “two very dissimilar streams of his theology—his doctrine of grace and his doctrine of the church.”[15]

Problematic for Augustine was his failure to be “carefully observant of the distinction between the empirical and the ideal Church” in that he often, and even unconsciously, attributed predicates to the former that belonged to the latter.[16] Thus, for Augustine the organized church tended to take the place of the congregatio sanctorum or the “body of Christ.”[17] Thus, as a result, the empirical church came to be, in the thinking of Augustine, “the sole mediatrix of grace, and therefore the sole distributor of salvation.”[18]

Not that Augustine’s theology was devoid of the categories that could have been helpful to him. There is, in his ecclesiology, a distinction between the invisible and visible church but, as Warfield says, he had only “something like a distant glimpse” of them.[19] What is more, during the Donatist controversy the church as the mediatrix of grace was necessarily thrown into high emphasis and so naturally eclipsed any distinction that might have provided some much needed balance.[20] Interestingly, Warfield, who obviously thought exceedingly well of Augustine, consoled himself in the thought that, “had he [Augustine] been granted, perhaps, ten years longer of vigorous life, he might have thought his way through this problem also.”[21]

Warfield’s study of Augustine’s ecclesiology was, of course, instructive for his own time. Not only was he living in a church that had left a trail of division and union in its wake, but modern industrial life, accompanied by modernist conceptions of organic unity, were being reflected in various ecclesiastical bodies, his own denomination included.[22] In other words, the government, political, and social machinations of the Presbyterian Church were beginning to drive ecclesiastical aims. One historian has noted, “As men were becoming associated in great power blocs—whether in industry, labor, civil government, or in other ways—churchmen felt the need of larger and tighter association for effective religious testimony and work.”[23] Thus, the visibility of the church was once again emphasized.

Warfield had observed the trend to ensconce the visible and subordinate the invisible in his own denomination by means of the church’s escalating attempt to reach for influence through ecclesiastical institutions and union. For example, in 1903 the Presbyterian Church created a Department of Church and Labor.[24] The creation of this new institutional department was itself a symptom of the church’s growing preoccupation with promotional and administrative matters to the extent that their growth paralleled the federal government during those years.[25]

Not everyone, however, had adopted the modernist mindset that seemed to be prevailing during that time. It was not that they viewed church expansion negatively or ecclesiastical federations disapprovingly.[26] Rather, according to Warfield’s colleague William Brenton Greene, the broad churchism of the day, which cared little for creeds and was indifferent to truth, was one of the chief characteristics of contemporary Christianity.[27] Thus, according to Greene, who was an OT professor at Princeton, the Department of Church and Labor was not a sign of orthopraxy but a symptom of unbelief facilitated by encroaching liberalism.[28]

Consequently, by all appearances the Presbyterian Church was becoming an organizational machine that was consciously or unconsciously confusing the empirical church with the ideal church, a move that had unmistakable doctrinal consequences. In the face of this growing tendency in the Presbyterian Church to put the focus primarily on the empirical or visible church, Warfield not only felt compelled to argue for what unity is, but also for what it is not. We will consider three statements concerning what did not characterize unity in the apostolic church.

First, according to Warfield, true church unity was not organic, at least “in the special sense of that word which would imply that it was founded on the inclusion of the whole Church under one universal government.”[29] That is not to say that the apostolic church lacked organization. It most certainly did not lack organization on the local level.[30] At that level, Warfield maintained, a local form of government was imposed upon the apostolic churches.[31] Still, Warfield claimed that the unity of the church was not organic: “no external bonds bind them [local congregations] together.”[32] According to Warfield, this was so because the visible unity of the apostolic church is not grounded in uniformity of organization.[33] Or to get even closer to the point, Warfield wrote that “no central authority ruled over the whole church” in the apostolic era.[34]

That was quite a claim for a Presbyterian who was Presbyterian by conviction. In his 1904 article, “Christian Unity and Church Union; Some Preliminary Principles,” Warfield spoke of the ultimate expression of unity among believers, saying, “We Presbyterians expect this organization to take effect in representative church courts.”[35] Nevertheless, speaking of the church’s existence prior to her ultimate expression of maturity in glory, Warfield’s claim went even further. The Scripture does not “contain any clear promise of or prominent provision for” a universal government or central organization of the visible church in the future.[36] The apostles, said Warfield, went forth to evangelize the world, not to rule it, and therefore they founded no dynasty, whether individual or collegiate.[37]

Second, visible unity of the apostolic church was not grounded in uniformity of worship. According to Warfield, it is no surprise that the church expressed a good degree of uniformity in matters of worship.[38] Warfield noted, “Everywhere men observed the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, prayed with outstretched hands,[39] sang psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, read the Scriptures and preached the Gospel.”[40] Warfield quickly points out, however, that this general similarity among the apostolic church fell short of complete uniformity.

For instance, he points out that the Jerusalem church allowed a bishop to emerge from its board of overseers even when a pastoral office was yet unknown to churches in other geographical areas. The temple service was still a vital part of Christian worship in Jerusalem. And everywhere Christian Jews continued to circumcise their children. According to Warfield, Christian worship was characterized everywhere by the freedom that would resemble an open prayer meeting more than a worship service.[41] All of this simply serves Warfield’s point that visible unity did not depend on uniformity of worship.

Third, according to the Princeton theologian, even more plain was the fact that the unity of the apostolic church was not grounded in a claim to singleness of origin.[42] In other words, the apostles did not establish a monolithic visible entity led by a hierarchy of leaders. Instead, says Warfield, “nobody cared whence a church drew its origin, so only it existed.”[43] The question of where a particular church came from was a question with which even the apostles were unconcerned. Here again, Warfield is putting to rest the notion that a visible unity can be traced from a particular visible succession.

Consequently, after examining the evidence for an external unity in the apostolic church, Warfield was clearly opposed to placing more weight upon the empirical church than it could bear. What is more, he was absolutely against confusing the attributes of the empirical church with that of the ideal church. To make such a mistake would invest the visible church with the quality of perfection that it had not, as of yet, attained. But the question remains, if it is “obvious that the visible unity of the Apostolic Church was not grounded in uniformity of organization, forms of worship, or even details of faith” not to mention a point of origin, then upon what was the church grounded?

II. What Ecclesiastical Unity Is

Warfield answered this question rather handily. He said, “In a word, the unity of the Apostolic Churches was grounded on the only thing they had in common—their common Christianity.”[44] But surely this begs the obvious question: what is Christianity? For Warfield, this again was not a difficult question. Christianity, said the Princetonian in an article printed in The Bible Student, is nothing more or less than “the truth.”[45] And, of course, if Christianity is the truth, then the source of Christianity, the Lord Himself, must be and is truth. Here Warfield cites John 14:6 in which Jesus claims not only to be the way and the life but also the truth.[46]

This has obvious implications. If Christianity is truth and is grounded in the One who is true, then, claims Warfield, it is the task and function of the Christian to bear witness to the truth and contend earnestly for the faith.[47] But despite the fact that this gospel proclamation is an external act through which the Spirit is the mediating cause, instrument, and bond of spiritual benefit to the awakened individual, Warfield, at least initially, brings our attention to the ground and base for our unity, which is the believer’s faith-wrought union with Christ.[48] In other words, it is not the dispensing of the Word even when it is accompanied by the Spirit that is the basis for unity. The source of unity is the Lord Jesus Christ, the head of the church.

In fact, Warfield pointedly says, “The sole principle of the Church’s unity is, therefore, the common union of its members with the heavenly head.”[49] In other words, the principium or source or point of origin of the church’s unity is our common union with the One who is the truth. Thus, says Warfield, “Every Christian, through whom flows the life of the Spirit imparted by the head, is of the body which is one.”[50] The point that Warfield is making is rather stark: church unity is grounded in our spiritual union with Christ and not some external manifestation.

What is more, this ecclesiology is not the result of abstract theologizing but is rather the fruit of biblical exegesis. For Warfield, nowhere “is the New Testament conception of the Church brought to more complete expression than in the Epistle to the Ephesians, which may be justly called the Epistle of the Church, the body of Christ.”[51] And this one-time NT professor brings out three aspects of the text in order to demonstrate that the source of the church’s unity cannot be discovered in anything earthly.[52]

The first aspect is that of divine election found in the beginning chapter of the epistle.[53] Paul tells the recipients of this circular letter about God’s selection “before the foundation of the world of a people in His beloved son,” which is obviously the church.[54] He then gives several lines that work out this electing grace of God. He speaks of redemption applied by the Spirit, manifested in the generations of those whose hope was in Christ, and the calling of the Gentiles.[55] Clearly, for Warfield, church unity finds its ground in the electing grace of the Triune God.

It is noteworthy that in 1901, a year after the second movement to revise the Confession of Faith came to light, a revision which, in large measure, took aim at the section on “God’s Decree,” Warfield penned an article for The Presbyterian and Reformed Review titled “Predestination in the Reformed Confessions.” The intent of the article was obvious. According to Warfield, the doctrine of predestination has always been the “consummate flower of the Reformed symbols,” and the Westminster Confession is the “ablest and ripest product of that Great Reformation, which was so fruitful in symbolic literature.”[56] With an eye to the new revision movement, Warfield noted that in Reformed confessions the church has always been defined in terms of election. Or as Warfield put it, “Special predestination … is most directly adduced in connection with the doctrine of the Church.”[57] A few examples will suffice to demonstrate Warfield’s argument.

According to Warfield, Zwingli treats the doctrine of election in connection with his treatment of the fall, redemption, and especially the church.[58] In Zwingli’s Fidei ratio he writes, “Of the church, then, we think as follows: the term Church is variously used in the Scriptures. For those elect ones whom God has destined to eternal life.”[59] The second example is from Calvin. Though it is not a creedal symbol, Warfield called the 1536 edition of Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion a symbolical book, noting that “no separate treatment was accorded to predestination and what is said on the topic emerges only incidentally … most fully in connection with the doctrine of the Church.”[60]

The final example that I will give comes from a confession written hastily by John Knox and adopted by Parliament in 1560, which became the legal Confession of the Reformed Church of Scotland when that Church was established in 1567.[61] Though written in haste, it affirms that the invisible church is made up of God’s elect in all ages and the visible church is made up of reprobates and the elect. Warfield says that the whole Reformed doctrine of predestination may be drawn from this creedal statement.[62] The point is clear. According to the heritage of the Reformation, the invisible church is rooted in God’s electing grace, and therefore the unity of the church is rooted in election.

The second aspect demonstrating that the unity of the church cannot be grounded in anything earthly is Warfield’s exegesis of Eph 4.[63] Warfield called Eph 4:4ff. a “remarkable enumeration of the things which Christ’s followers have in common if they be his at all.”[64] Warfield observed that the list in the passage enumerates a bond of attachment which unites us to the one body, the one Lord, the one God; “and is done in such a way as to adduce in each case both what may be called the vital and the instrumental bond—thus yielding a triad of triads.”[65] For Warfield, this meant that though we may give evidence of being united to Christ in our baptism, the ground of our union is the heavenly Head and the bond or instrument of that union is the Holy Spirit.[66] This, for Warfield, is the unity of the Spirit of which Paul speaks.

The third aspect demonstrating that unity is not grounded in the earthly was the figure of a circle. Warfield said, “The true figure of the church is a circle: every particle of the circumference is held in its relation to all other particles by the common relation of each to the center.”[67] Of course for Warfield a figure held no Scriptural authority. But it did illustrate the point of the text, and for Warfield the point was crystal clear, “The sole principle of the Church’s unity is, therefore, the common union of its members with the heavenly head.”[68]

All of this talk, however, about the church’s unity being grounded in the invisible church described as the elect of God tethered to God by the Spirit raises an inevitable question: is there any external unity? Is Warfield guilty of stressing the invisible aspect of the church, perhaps as a result of what he perceives as its under-emphasis in other quarters of the church? Is he, too, guilty of lacking balance?

Having considered the ground for the unity of the church, consider his four-point summary of how the post-apostolic church might move toward a visible unity. According to Warfield, these points emerge from a galvanized understanding that unity is not grounded in anything earthly but is grounded in God. Thus, with an eye toward visible unity, he says:

1. We are not to seek it in the inclusion of all Christians in one organization and under one government.
2. Nor yet are we to seek it in the assimilation of all organized bodies of Christians to one another in forms of government or worship.
3. Still less are we to seek it in a merely mechanical application of the rule of continuity, as if the continuance of Christ’s church in the world depended on human succession.
4. Least of all, are we to seek unity by surrendering all public or organized testimony to all truth except that minimum which—just because it is the minimum, less than which no man can believe and be a Christian—all Christians of all names can unite in confessing.[69]

At first glance, not only do both of Warfield’s articles seem to lay primary stress upon the invisible church but these four guides seem almost to downplay any visible unity at all. We might, almost without exception, call these points Warfield’s apophatic guide to visible church unity. And yet, in the final point, Warfield does tell us, almost reluctantly, wherein we might find visible unity.

Warfield says, “There is a sense, of course, in which the visible unity of the Church is based on the common belief and confession of the body of truth held alike by all who are Christians.”[70] This visible unity naturally emerges from Warfield’s analysis of invisible unity in the apostolic church. In other words, if invisible unity is grounded in the truth, which is God, then the visible unity of the post-apostolic church must also be grounded in the truth. Thus, in this way, the one church can be grounded both invisibly and visibly.

It is at just this point, however, that a question emerges. If, as Warfield says, “it is equally obvious that the visible unity of the Apostolic Church was not grounded in uniformity in organization, forms of worship, or even details of faith,”[71] then how can he later contend in the same article that “the visible unity of the Church is based on the common belief and confession of the body of truth held alike by all who are Christians”?[72] In other words, to put it tersely, how is the modern church able to enjoy unity around a common testimony of truth when the apostolic church did not enjoy a visible unity around “even details of faith”? In order to understand this point we must press on with our investigation.

III. The Progressive And Constructive Nature Of Systematic Theology

The answer to this last question is found in the theological distinction Warfield makes between the existence and perfection of the church in both of his articles on ecclesiastical unity. To grasp this distinction we need to begin with Warfield’s general but vital claim that “all that is essential to the foundation of unity must be found in the Church of every age—the very existence of the Church provides it.”[73] This of course means that there is nothing that is actually new in terms of what God has revealed concerning his church. Everything we need for understanding ecclesiology, let alone the unity of the church, exists and is found in Scripture. As Warfield says, “The Scriptures form the only sufficing source of theology.”[74] Furthermore, comparing the theologian to the scientist, Warfield wrote, “The progressive men in any science are the men who stand firmly on the basis of the already ascertained truth,” which, for Warfield, was Scripture.[75]

However, this does not mean that everything in Scripture has been already mapped out, schematized, and systematized. Take once again the organization of the apostolic church as an example. With regard to it Warfield writes, “The absence of such an organization is obvious on the face of the New Testament record, nor do its pages contain any clear promise of or prominent provision for it for the future.”[76] Warfield’s point is clear enough; the apostolic church had no organization beyond its local government.

Contrary to first impressions, Warfield is not saying that there is no promise or provision for a future ecclesiastical organization beyond the local government. Rather, he is saying that no “clear” promise or “prominent” provision exists for the future, which is a far cry from saying that no promise or provision exists. Thus, the obvious point is that an extensive systematic theology is not a corollary to the bare existence of the church. Equally true for Warfield, however, is that the existence of the church does not mean the absence of all the propositional revelation required to construct a fuller ecclesiology within a robust theological system. In fact, fuller theological development is expected from the church. Or to put it in another way, a robust systematic theology is a corollary to the church’s perfection. Surely this point is obvious if, in fact, the church truly is God’s instrument for the preservation and propagation of the truth and is therefore the pillar and ground of the truth.

This theological growth and development that Warfield has in mind is brought forcefully into focus when he argues for the church’s eventual and inevitable perfection. For example, according to Warfield, visible ecclesiastical unity is not dependent upon the existence of the church so much as it is on its perfection.[77] In other words, even from the beginning, the church’s formulation of ecclesiology, not to mention other theological loci, was like a seed. It was intended to grow and mature. Therefore, its unity, a fruit of the church’s theological maturation, depended on the perfection that was inherent in its DNA, a code that could be found in Scripture.

So, despite the fact that the church has no new revelation, it must hammer out its theology in order to attain to what Warfield called absoluteness and so be presented to the Bridegroom without spot or blemish, in other words, perfect.[78] According to Warfield, reaching for this absoluteness is the goal and aim of theology. In his 1896 article “The Idea of Systematic Theology” he writes,

The task of thoroughly exploring the pages of revelation, soundly gathering from them their treasures of theological teaching and carefully fitting these into their due places in a system whereby they may be preserved from misunderstanding, perversion, and misuse, and given a new power to convince the understanding, move the heart, and quicken the will, becomes thus a holy duty to our own and our brothers’ souls as well as an eager pleasure of our intellectual nature.[79]

Thus, the way in which we systematize the truth handed down to us by biblical exegesis is not a matter of indifference. On the contrary, Warfield contends, “If we misconceive it in its parts or in its relations, not only do our views of truth become confused and erroneous, but also our religious life becomes dwarfed or contorted.”[80] Thus, the theologian is reaching beyond existence to perfection knowing that he will only attain such a state in glory, and yet it is his holy duty to make theological progress that the church might mature from seed to blossom.

Therefore, living between the church’s existence and perfection, Warfield declares, “It is ours to advance steadily towards this ideal, as it is God’s delight to be ‘daily smoothing the wrinkles and wiping the spots of his church away.’”[81] In other words, it is our task to advance steadily in the expression of theological knowledge that ever seeks to attain precision and perfection for it is God who works in us to bring his bride to the day of glory. Thus, it is the church’s expression of truth systematically that bridges the gap between the church’s existence in the present and her perfection in glory.

However, the obvious must be stated. The expression of truth systematically entails progress and development. In The Idea of Systematic Theology, Warfield, though noting his reticence to use the phrase “progressive orthodoxy” because of its strange usage in other contexts, nevertheless admits that it “is not an inapt description of the building of this theological house.”[82] Again he says, “Let us assert that the history of theology has been and ever must be a progressive orthodoxy.”[83] For Warfield, this means at least two important things. First, we must be orthodox. And second, we must be progressively orthodox, which means that “we are ever growing more and more orthodox as more and more truth is being established.”[84]

A classic example of the type of theological development that Warfield writes about is found in the debate over the nature of Scripture, a debate with which he was thoroughly familiar having been invited to co-author an article with A. A. Hodge in The Presbyterian Review in 1881 that was the opening salvo in a long and contentious battle in the church. At the outset of their article, Hodge and Warfield took notice of how the word “inspiration” was used to express the entire agency of God which produced that divine element that distinguishes Scripture from all other writings.[85] Their concern was to posit “a definite and never-varying sense” of the word inspiration, which was based not on an agenda but on Scripture.[86]

What is crucial for our purposes is to note that these men did not think of themselves as innovators, which was the accusation from Briggs and others like him, but instead these Princeton men understood their actions to be consistent with the praxis of constructive historical and systematic theology. Consider their statement from the opening pages:

The history of theology is full of parallel instances, in which terms of the highest import have come to be accepted in a more fixed and narrow sense than they bore at first either in Scriptural or early ecclesiastical usage, and with only a remote relation to their etymology; as, for instance, Regeneration, Sacrament, etc.[87]

These men obviously understood themselves to be engaged in legitimate theological activity that both had learned from the same theological source. Consider these words of Charles Hodge, professor of systematic theology at Princeton, the alma mater of both Hodge and Warfield:

The true method of theology is, therefore, the inductive, which assumes that the Bible contains all the facts or truths which form the contents of theology, just as the facts of nature are the contents of the natural sciences. It is also assumed that the relation of these Biblical facts to each other, the principles involved in them, the laws which determine them, are in the facts themselves, and are to be deduced from them, just as the laws of nature are deduced from the facts of nature.[88]

Surely one cannot help but think of Warfield’s own expressions at this point. The theologian is he who works with ascertained truth, exploring the pages of revelation, soundly gathering from them their treasures of theological teaching and carefully fitting these into their due places in a system. Warfield had learned well from one whom he considered his ideal teacher.[89]

For Warfield, one important implication of the systematic theological expression of truth was the existence of denominations. In fact, Warfield contends that differing denominations arise not from being sinfully separate but from duty.[90] What is more, Warfield did not see the trend toward visible unity as obedience to the Lord’s prayer in John 17 but rather as evidence “of the decay of doctrinal consciousness, not to say of vital religion” in the church.[91] For Warfield, despite sounding paradoxical, separate denominations in pursuit of the expression of truth systematically could more fully express the unity for which Christ prayed than if they were “forced into the bonds of galling external unification.”[92] This contention raises a new question: if denominations could be a powerful vehicle to express the unity of truth for which Christ prayed, what could destroy this unity?

IV. Theological Minimalism And Concession

It may seem counterintuitive to argue that denominations preserve true unity while visible attempts may be galling, but Warfield was operating from a clear understanding of the right place of systematic theology within the church. The systematic expression of truth leads the church ever further toward the perfect expression of truth and thus the perfection of the church. According to Warfield, “The route to unity lies in no other quarter than in the pathway that leads to perfection.”[93]

What is more, Warfield does not leave us to speculate on the matters with which systematic theology is to deal: they include government, worship, and creedal testimony.[94] These three aspects appeared in our first point, where Warfield argued that “the visible unity of the Apostolic Church was not grounded in uniformity in organization, forms of worship, or even details of faith.”[95] Yet the church has made progress since its apostolic beginnings.

Thus, in 1904 with Warfield’s denomination, the Presbyterian Church, considering a merger with the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, Warfield contended that the true churchman who desired unity was “not he that sacrifices organized testimony to truth already once attained, not he that compromises the excellency of an organic government once constituted, not he that yields a purity of worship once secured.”[96] Rather, said Warfield,

The only organization which the whole Church should ever adopt—or even can adopt—is the perfect one; the only worship which the whole Church should ever employ—or can ever employ—is the perfect one; the only creed which is fitted to become the form of sacred words in which all God’s people express their faith—or in which the totality of God’s people will ever express their faith—is the perfect one—inclusive of all revealed truth, exclusive of all error.[97]

For Warfield, the only unity open to the church was by way of the road leading from existence to perfection. And to give up theological progress for the sake of external displays of unity was to exchange reality for a shadow.[98]

Warfield’s position did not turn him into a theological isolationist. It was his contention that denominations ought to interact, for he thought that there will surely be a remnant left according to the election of grace to bear witness to this element or that which has been omitted from the general testimony of other churches.[99] What is more, it is the duty of those who are progressing toward what is best in worship, what is soundest in government, and what is truest in faith to press continuously and enthusiastically their testimony on the attention and acceptance of all whom we should not be ashamed to call our brethren.[100]

Consequently, Warfield was absolutely opposed to what he called the “concessive method” working in the church. The concessive method operated on the principle of defending the minimum.[101] In 1895, Warfield published several articles in The Presbyterian Quarterly documenting the latest phase of rationalism abroad in the American church in order to demonstrate what was being defended as minimum ground upon which we might all stand together. But in order to help his readers understand what is lost by the application of the concessive method, Warfield took his example from what was happening with regard to the authority of Scripture.

Concession begins, said Warfield, by “rejecting the authority of the Bible for minor matters only—in the ‘minima,’ in ‘circumstantials’ and ‘by-passages’ and ‘incidental remarks,’ and the like.”[102] The next step in the descent is to reject the Bible’s authority for everything except matters of faith and practice.[103] Then comes unwillingness to bow to all the doctrinal teaching or ethical precepts from Scripture, and instead, according to Warfield, we find men who “subject the religious and ethical contents of the Bible to the judgment of their ‘spiritual instinct.’”[104] Finally, maintained Warfield, “the circle is completed by setting aside the whole Bible as authority; perchance with the remark … that in the apostolic age men depended on the spirit in his own heart” because no one ever dreamed of making the Scriptures, and much less the NT, the authoritative word of God.[105]

Not surprisingly, as Warfield later pointed out in 1896, “it may not unnaturally happen sometime that the defense of the minimum alone will turn out to be the minimum defense of the Gospel.”[106] For Warfield, this would be a reversal, a return to existence at best and a forsaking of perfection. Several years later, in 1920, when the Presbyterian Church was engaged in a “plan of union for evangelical churches” Warfield had similar concerns. The creed was, yet again, a minimalist creed. After pointing out that even the gospel had been left out of the proposed creed, Warfield said, “Let us by all means have fellowship: but let our fellowship be first of all with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ—with whom we can have fellowship, we are told, only if we walk in the light of his revealed salvation.”[107] Even the year prior to his death, Warfield was calling the church back to the source of unity and truth that would guide the church’s government, worship, and beliefs so that God’s people might advance on the road toward perfection.

Notes

1. David P. Smith, B. B. Warfield’s Scientifically Constructive Theological Scholarship (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2011), 45.
2. Fred G. Zaspel, The Theology of B. B. Warfield: A Systematic Summary (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2010), 513.
3. Benjamin B. Warfield, “True Church Unity: What It Is,” Homiletic Review 20 (1890).
4. Charles A. Briggs, Whither? A Theological Question for the Times (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1889), 64.
5. Ibid., 73.
6. Ibid.
7. Lefferts A. Loetscher, The Broadening Church: A Study of Theological Issues in the Presbyterian Church Since 1869 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1954), 39.
8. Benjamin B. Warfield, “The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America,” Presbyterian and Reformed Review 1 (1890): 489.
9. Loetscher, Broadening Church, 39. Warfield offered his resignation on June 4th of that same year but the faculty declined to accept it.
10. Benjamin B. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union; Some Preliminary Principles,” Presbyterian Banner 91 (June 1904/1905).
11. Loetscher, Broadening Church, 94.
12. Benjamin B. Warfield, “Some Exegetical Notes on 1 Timothy,” Presbyterian Review 8 (New York: Published for The Presbyterian Review Association by Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1887): 507.
13. Loetscher, Broadening Church, 8.
14. Warfield’s brother, Ethelbert, explains in a brief biographical essay that Warfield had planned on embarking on a career in experimental science and that his tastes were strongly scientific. Ethelbert presents as evidence the fact that his brother Benjamin combed the neighborhood looking for specimens and counted Audubon’s works on birds and mammals his chief treasure (see Benjamin B. Warfield, Revelation and Inspiration, vol. 1 of The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield [Grand Rapids: Baker, 2000], vi [hereafter, Works]).
15. Benjamin B. Warfield, Studies in Tertullian and Augustine, vol. 4 of Works, 409. A constant theme throughout Warfield’s study on Augustine was that “two children were thus struggling in the womb of his mind” (cf. p. 283). As a result, the Roman Catholic Church laid claim to his empirical ecclesiology and the Protestant reformers laid hold of his view of salvation. In Warfield’s estimation, “The real Augustine was the Augustine of the doctrine of grace” (p. 284).
16. Ibid., 121-22.
17. Ibid., 121.
18. Ibid., 122.
19. Ibid., 409.
20. Ibid., 122.
21. Ibid., 285.
22. Loetscher, Broadening Church, 93.
23. Ibid.
24. Gary Scott Smith, “Conservative Presbyterians: The Gospel, Social Reform, and the Church in the Progressive Era,” Journal of Presbyterian History 70, no. 2 (1992): 93.
25. Loetscher, Broadening Church, 93.
26. An example, by conservatives, to emphasize a more empirical ecclesiology is seen in an article published in The Presbyterian Review in 1880 wherein the author asked if the Presbyterian Council, which had met in Scotland in 1877, was prepared to make an assertion of visible and world-wide unity. For the author, who noted that the papacy had gathered Scotland into its episcopal hierarchy in 1878, that question ought to be answered with a resounding yes (A. Taylor Innes, “The Catholicity of Presbyterianism,” Presbyterian Review 1 [1880]: 484).
27. William B. Greene Jr., “Broad Churchism and the Christian Life,” Princeton Theological Review 4 (1906): 306.
28. William B. Greene Jr., “The Crises of Christianity and Their Significance,” Princeton Theological Review 17 (1919): 347. Like the OT prophets, Greene faithfully cried out against religious and moral deterioration in society while at the same time combating the liberalizing trends of the social gospel.
29. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 484.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid., 485.
32. Ibid., 484.
33. Ibid., 485.
34. Ibid., 484.
35. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
36. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 484.
37. Ibid.
38. Ibid., 485.
39. Warfield wrote that Paul’s epistle “contains the proper ordering of the public worship of the Church, especially the public prayers” (“Some Exegetical Notes on 1 Timothy,” 502). He goes even further, stating that a study of 1 Tim 2:8-10 will contain “a matter of prescription” (ibid.). But Warfield also says, in keeping with his 1890 article, “We should guard ourselves, however, from taking too external a view of this prescription of how men should pray” (p. 503).
40. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 485.
41. Ibid.
42. Ibid.
43. Ibid.
44. Ibid.
45. Benjamin B. Warfield, “Christianity the Truth,” in Selected Shorter Writings, ed. John E. Meeter, 2 vols. (Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian & Reformed, 2005), 2:213.
46. Ibid.
47. Ibid., 2:214.
48. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 485-86, 488.
49. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
50. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 488.
51. Ibid., 486.
52. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
53. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 486. This is the only one of the three aspects not common to both “True Church Unity: What It Is” and “Christian Unity and Church Union.”
54. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 486.
55. Ibid.
56. Benjamin B. Warfield, Studies in Theology, vol. 9 of Works, 121, 148.
57. Ibid., 125.
58. Ibid., 122.
59. Ibid., 149-50.
60. Ibid., 133.
61. Ibid., 140.
62. Ibid.
63. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
64. Ibid.
65. Ibid.
66. It is noteworthy that though there is much overlap in emphasis between Warfield and Hodge at this point, Warfield does not follow Hodge’s exegesis developed in his commentary on Ephesians. Cf. Charles Hodge, Ephesians (Old Tappan, NJ: Fleming H. Revell, n.d.), 203-10. See also Warfield’s comments about Hodge as an exegete in Warfield, “Dr. Charles Hodge as a Teacher of Exegesis,” in Selected Shorter Writings, 1:438-39.
67. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
68. Ibid.
69. This is a summing up of points enumerated in Warfield, “True Unity,” 488.
70. Ibid.
71. Ibid., 485.
72. Ibid., 488.
73. Ibid., 489.
74. Warfield, Studies in Theology, 63.
75. Ibid., 78.
76. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 484.
77. Ibid., 489.
78. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
79. Warfield, Studies in Theology, 80.
80. Ibid.
81. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
82. Warfield, Studies in Theology, 78.
83. Ibid.
84. Ibid.
85. Archibald A. Hodge and Benjamin B. Warfield, “Inspiration,” Presbyterian Review 2 (April 1881): 226.
86. Ibid., 225.
87. Ibid.
88. Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1977), 1:17.
89. Warfield, “Dr. Charles Hodge,” in Selected Shorter Writings, 1:439.
90. Warfield, “Church Unity and Church Union,” 8.
91. Ibid.
92. Ibid.
93. Ibid., 7.
94. Ibid.
95. Warfield, “True Church Unity,” 485.
96. Warfield, “Christian Unity and Church Union,” 7.
97. Ibid.
98. Ibid.
99. Ibid.
100. Ibid.
101. Warfield, Selected Shorter Writings, 2:675.
102. Warfield, Studies in Theology, 589.
103. Ibid.
104. Ibid.
105. Ibid.
106. Warfield, Selected Shorter Writings, 2:678.
107. Ibid., 1:388.