What is a Christian Redux
Jonathan Rowe on Feb 20th 2008 03:00 pm |
Eric Alan Isaacson leaves a very compelling comment on the proper definition of Christianity, one with which I admittidly struggle. Though not an atheist, I don’t consider myself a “Christian,” (even though I am Catholic by baptism) but have noted were I to join a Church it would probably be the Quakers, Unitarian-Universalists, or some kind of liberal Christian denomination like the Episcopalians (i.e., the ones that recognize same-sex marriages). His comment deals with what belief system merits the label “Christian,” and he argues for a broad, liberal understanding of the term. My understanding is fairly strict, but not as strict as some would have it. For instance, I don’t think one needs to be “born-again” to be a “real Christian”; nor do I think one needs to be a member of any particular Church, i.e., the Roman Catholic Church.
Rather, I argue you need to assent to particular traditional orthodox creeds (i.e., the Nicene and Apostle’s). Indeed, one can be socially and theologically liberal on certain matters, for instance politics or social morality, and still be a “Christian” as long as one’s Christology is orthodox. That means that the Pope, Andrew Sullivan, Pat Robertson, Jimmy Carter and Garry Wills are all “Christians,” but Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and those who are so theologically liberal that they deny the Virgin Birth, Trinity, Incarnation, Atonement, and Resurrection are not. (Even though Sullivan and Wills are pro-gay social liberals — Sullivan in a same-sex marriage himself — they all nonetheless are orthodox in their beliefs on Christ).
Who knows, one day I might become a theologically liberal Christian who at once embraces the label “Christian,” but also denies Jesus’ Godhood as well as other parts of Christian orthodoxy. Indeed, one reason why Dr. Gregg Frazer refuses to term Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Franklin, et al. “Christians” is because, as an evangelical, he defines the term strictly. For instance, to evangelicals and Catholics, Christians believe in a Triune God. If you don’t then you aren’t a Christian regardless of what you call yourself. I think that looking at the traditional creeds to which evangelicals, Roman Catholics and the Orthodox Church all assent certainly is one legitimate way to understand what is a “real Christian.” Isaacson argues for the other. If America’s key Founders really were “Christians” and if America was founded on “Christian principles,” it would be in the broad, theologically liberal sense for which Isaacson argues. These “Christian principles,” it should be noted, evangelicals and Catholics consider “heresy.” Indeed one of my readers in the past aptly asked, “was America founded on a Christian heresy?” Arguably yes.
Hi Jonathan,
I’m troubled by those who insist that only people who believe in one way can be “true Christians.” If Mormons consider themselves followers of Jesus, that’s good enough for me to regard them as Christians. If Trinitarian Evangelicals regard themselves as followers of Jesus, I’ll consider them Christians too — even though, so far as I can tell, Jesus never claimed to be God.
If someone like John Adams and Thomas Jefferson and the Rev. Dr. Joseph Priestley honored Jesus and endeavored to follow his teachings, they should not be denied the name “Christian” merely because others who claim that name have embraced any number of extra-biblical doctrines.
I’ve heard Catholics occasionally say that theirs is the only “true church,” suggesting perhaps that Protestants are not truly Christians. I’ve heard Protestant preachers denounce the Pope as the Anti-Christ, insisting that Catholics can’t be true Christians because they follow the Pope rather than Christ.
I must confess, such attitudes offend my sensibilities.
And yet, I find you, an open-minded and liberal chap, adopting the same stance, and suggesting that Unitarians and Mormons can’t be Christians.
I am reminded, quite frankly, of how New Hampshire’s Supreme Court ruled in 1868 the Dover, New Hampshire, First Unitarian Society of Christians’ chosen minister — the Rev. Francis Ellingwood Abbot — was insufficiently “Christian” to serve the Congregation that had called him. Justice Jonathan Everett Sargent’s opinion for the court quoted passages from Abbot’s sermons, to show that the minister was too open-minded to serve his congregation.
The Rev. Abbot, after all, had once preached:
“Whoever has been so fired in his own spirit by the overwhelming thought of the Divine Being as to kindle the flames in the hearts of his fellow men, whether Confucius, or Zoroaster, or Moses, or Jesus, or Mohammed, has proved himself to be a prophet of the living God; and thus every great historic religion dates from a genuine inspiration by the Eternal Spirit.”
In another sermon, Rev. Abbot even declared:
“America is every whit as sacred as Judea. God is as near to you and to me, as ever he was to Moses, to Jesus, or to Paul. Wherever a human soul is born into the love of truth and high virtue, there is the ‘Holy Land.’ Wherever a human soul has uttered its sincere and brave faith in the Divine, and thus bequeathed to us the legacy of inspired words, there is the ‘Holy Bible.’”
“If Protestantism would include Mr. Abbot in this case,” Justice Sargent opined for New Hampshire’s highest court, “it would of course include Thomas Jefferson, and by the same rule also Thomas Paine, whom Gov. Plumer of New Hampshire called ‘that outrageous blasphemer,’ that ‘infamous blasphemer,’ ‘that miscreant Paine,’ whose ‘Age of Reason’ Plumer had read ‘with unqualified disapprobation of its tone and temper, its course vulgarity, and its unfair appeals to the passions and prejudices of his readers.’”
Hale v. Everett, 53 N.H. 9, 16 Am. Rep. 82, 1868 N.H. LEXIS 47 (1868). See Charles B. Kinney, Jr., Church & State: The Struggle for Separation in New Hampshire, 1630-1900 113 (New York: Teachers College, Columbia Univ., 1955) (“One of the more celebrated cases in New Hampshire jurisprudence is that of Hale versus Everett.”); Carl H. Esbeck, Dissent and Disestablishment: The Church-State Settlement in the Early American Republic, 2004 B.Y.U. L. Rev. 1385, 1534 n.541 (“As late as 1868, the state supreme court decided that a Unitarian minister would not be allowed to use the town meeting house because of his heterodoxy, and in spite of being called and settled by a majority of the community.”).
You might suppose that being run out of the pulpit would sour the Rev. Abbot in his attitudes toward those who thought themselves more orthodox than he was. You would be wrong. Abbot went on to edit The Index, and on his retirement from that position in 1880 addressed those who gathered in his honor: “I know we are here Unitarians and Non-Unitarians, and I rejoice to stand with Christians, with Catholic and Protestant Christians alike, for justice and purity; and I will always do so. These things are more important than our little differences of theological opinion.” Farewell Dinner to Francis Ellingwood Abbot, on Retiring from the Editorship of “The Index” 14 (Boston: George H. Ellis, 1880) (remarks of Rev. Abbot, June 24, 1880).
It may be noted that Frederick Douglass praised Rev. Abbot for doing “much to break the fetters of religious superstition, for which he is entitled to gratitude.” Farewell Dinner, supra, at p. 48 (letter of June 15, 1880, from Frederick Douglass to the Rev. M.J. Savage).
I think it a tremendous mistake, Jonathan, for you to side with the likes of Justice Sargent, who think they are entitled to determine who can, and who cannot, be called a true “Christian.” In truth, Justice Sargent may have been somewhat more liberal in his attitudes than you are – for he and the New Hampshire Supreme Court at least accepted the notion that one can be a genuine Unitarian Christian, even as they ruled that Rev. Abbot was far too unorthodox even to preach in a Unitarian church.
Peace be with you!
Eric Alan Isaacson
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While it’s obvious anachronistic to argue that Jesus was Christian, your definitions would exclude Paul, and probably all of the founders of the Church. Paul never mentioned the virgin birth, which probably means that he had never heard of it. Mark doesn’t mention it either. Jesus doesn’t talk about it in any of the Gospels. That an idea developed from a mistranslation of Isaiah should define “Christianity” doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
I think that a more authentic definition of Christianity is that given by Jesus himself when he defined his true followers, not in terms of doctrine, but in terms of action:
“He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me; and he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.” (John 14:21)
Thus, as a Christian Quaker, I’m more concerned with orthopraxy, as defined by Jesus, than with orthodoxy, as defined by the church. Your definition seems to me to be more about “Churchianity” than Christianity. And, as Ian notes, most early Christians knew nothing of many of the doctrines in the Nicene Creed.
It’s important to keep in mind that creeds are not, as usually assumed, instruments of unity but instruments of division. They were and always are the result of theological disputes, and are imposed to define the “other.” Frankly, I think that what good the church has done throughout history has been in large part despite the structures and doctrines that are basically the fruits of the church’s surrender to the “powers and principalities” that make up the domination system (cf. Walter Wink).
There’s going to be some differences in which definition of Christian is right, depending on what your interests are in defining it. A sociologist of religions might find it more interesting to define Christianity according to worship practices on the premise that church attendance is the most likely thing to affect social behavior. A psychologist might want to include only those who believe in substitutionary atonement, on the premise that the need for forgiveness has a greater psychological impact than other elements of Christianity. A theologian, on the other hand, may be more concerned with defining Christianity in a way that preserves God’s sovereignty (ie, you don’t become a Christian by your own effort but by the Grace of God), or in a way that makes Philippians 2:1-11 coherent (why should every head bow at the name of Jesus Christ? What does it mean that He is Lord? etc). A seeker may want to define Christianity in such a way that excludes his present beliefs but does not exclude all live options (he might be willing to consider that God is a Trinity & that the scriptures are inspired but consider the kind of biblical literalism of the Moody Bible institute completely off the radar).
I don’t think any of these motives for defining Christianity is illegitimate. And I think it’s perfectly acceptable to have multiple definitions that serve different functions. Obviously, it is not good to look for a definition that gives you a big stick to beat people with — “his hope is not in the resurrection! Let’s get him!” But aside from that, …
Anyway, Jonathan, I am curious what your interest is in defining Christianity.
At the risk of exposing both my ego and my laziness, let me quote myself from one of my earliest entries on this blog:
The question of who counts as or is properly determined to be a Christian (or Jew, Muslim, etc.) can best be understood in terms of a legal concept called trademark genericide. Xerox, Band-aid and Kleenex, all originally specific and proprietary names, over time became so frequently used by the public as generic terms for any sort or brand of photocopying, bandages and facial tissue that the original owners of these trademarks were ironically damaged by their own success. (Readers seeking further explication of this topic might consider Googling, um, googling “trademark genericide.”)
Arguments as to who is or is not a Christian date back to Apostolic times (see, e.g., 1 Corinthians.) By the time of the Great Schism, and certainly after the Protestant Reformation, “Christian” increasingly became, as it were, a genericized trademark. Internecine disputes have raged ever since over what constitute the minimum necessary or sufficient beliefs or practices to be considered a Christian and, as in the case of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints, whether additional beliefs or practices disqualify one from using the term.
In a sense, these sorts of disputes are similar to Wittgenstein’s brilliantly insightful question, “Can one play chess without the queen?” The answer, of course, is “It depends.” That is to say, we can certainly choose to extend the concept of chess to include a similar but significantly different game, i.e., one without the queen or, for that matter, one in which pawns can always move two spaces at a time. We can also decide to restrict the use of the term “chess” to the game as FIDE defines and, as it were, regulates it (perhaps calling the variants Quess and Twess?)
Alternatively, we can view the matter as similar to the one between dictionary prescriptivists and the descriptivists. As between the two, I think that the latter have an easier time of it when it comes to a term with the sort of linguistic and cultural baggage that Christianity has. On the other hand, while most of us are probably reconciled to the notion that, at the very least, the term has come to have a somewhat elastic range, it is not, cannot be infinitely elastic. After all, if there is no point beyond which we are not willing to say “Okay, we’ll call that Christianity, too,” then we’re really not ascribing anything significant by the term anyway.
Anyway, Jonathan, I am curious what your interest is in defining Christianity.
My curiousity relates almost entirely to my studies on the religion of America’s Founders and the political theology of the American Founding. I have certain informed opinions as to the tenets of the religion of America’s key Founders (i.e., denial of the Trinity, and infallibility of the Bible, the strong emphasis on “natural religion”/reason, and the belief that most if not all religious systems even non-biblical ones are valid) and the issue is whether those tenets are “Christian,” and if so in what sense.
D.A. Ridgley (above) gets it right, I think, in observing that the question of a definition of Christianity comes down to descriptivists versus prescriptivists. Jonathan, by insisting on the creeds as essential to the Christian definition, you’re basically coming down on the side of the prescriptivists. The most obvious problem being, in my eyes, that there are DIFFERENT WAYS of believing in the creeds. In “Which Level of God Do You Believe In?”, http://www.beliefnet.com/story/153/story_15318_1.html for example, you have a simple presentation of the concept that religious beliefs vary according to the level of holistic development of the individual. The way a child is a Christian, or a baptized infant, or a rational adult, or an adult with mental disorders, for example, are different. Yet few — except you pesky prescriptivists ;-) — would deny that they are “true Christians”. If someone is sincere in their self-identity as a Christian, that’s good enough for me. It really comes down to sincerity.
Against a prescriptivist definition of Christianity…
Jonathan Rowe argues here that assent to particular theological creeds is essentially constitutive of Christian identity. I would observe, first, that he is basically coming down on the side of the prescriptivists against descriptivists. The most obv…
Thanks for the discussion. I think, in today’s day and age, you are right that a “descriptive” label of the term “Christian” would include more unorthodox systems. However, in the 18th Century, just about every official Christian denomination (all of the Protestant sects, the RC Church and the Orthodox Church) recognized Arianism and Socinianism to be heresies.
There have always been pockets of heretics within these Churches. But nonetheless, the sects deemed certain beliefs “heresies.” A good reason why such “heretical” systems are now free to set up their own denominations and call themselves “Christian” is because the Enlightenment broke the monopoly that orthodox Churches had on the state. And many of those leading lights pushing for Church & State to be separated were, intuitively, heretics, many of whom like America’s key Founders were in the closet until the 19th Century when it was a little safer to “come out” as a Unitarian.
I don’t really think the descriptivist/prescriptivist distinction is especially helpful in this case, though. Jonathan’s claim, as I understand it, is that drawing the boundary around Christianity in such a way that excludes Unitarians is the best way of understanding the political dynamics of a particular era. That’s a claim that is debatable, but as far as I can tell, it includes only a hypothetical imperative: IF you want to understand those political dynamics, THEN you should make this distinction, which is justifiably and most plainly expressed by defining “Christian” in such and such a way.
Eric Isaacson, on the other hand, simply asserts that such an exclusive definition is wrong, is somehow tantamount to tossing well meaning preachers out of churches simply for following their consciences. It seems to me that both Jonathan and Eric are prescribing a certain definition of Christianity, but the contexts out of which they operate are different, and I think that the scope of each prescription is rather different.
It is, of course, illegitimate to say that, because Christianity of the 18th century is best understood according to such and such a set of characteristics, anyone in the 21st century who fails to meet these criteria had best not call himself a Christian. But it is not even yet prescriptive for Jonathan (or anyone else) to say that, because his interests have to do with the 18th century, that we ought to assume, prima facie, that whenever he uses the word “Christian,” he means it in the more exclusive sense. The description becomes a prescription if he tells others that they should use it as he does (ie, it becomes a prescription in the unfolding of his historical, political writings on the 18th century & in the hypothetical imperative I mentioned above).
This conversation is interesting and all, but it misses the point.
Jon Rowe is seeking a political definition of Christianity, regarding a modern understanding about a very different time. The definition has political implications.
Barton, et al, are making a claim: America was founded by Christians as a Christian Nation. They mean a bunch of guys who could’ve joined the Moral Majority or Christian Coalition or today’s GOP.
It’s the claim of Barton and company that matters here. What would Barton’s followers consider a Christian?
Well, it wouldn’t be Unitarian, Jehovah’s Witnesses, or Mormon. In fact, Barton has gone so far as to claim that 52 of the 55 signers of the Declaration of Independence were “evangelicals,” and that the remaining three (Franklin and Jefferson were two of them) were sympathetic and pro-Evangelical.
Since that wasn’t the case, what are the implications?
As a “Christian” myself (quite orthodox, thank you) I think David Barton is a pied piper, and the Christian Right movement has done more harm to the Gospel, both salvific and social, than it has helped.
Refuting Barton is, for me, a valuable exercise. If it turns out that Barton is wrong, and can be discredited, then a key buttress of the Christan Right movement is hacked out from under it.
The Founders were NOT Christians, according to the definition David Barton’s followers would accept and understand. Now, spread the good news — forward one of Jon Rowe’s blog posts to a conservative Christian you know!
Heh. Thanks as always Jim!
Jonathan writes that “just about every official Christian denomination (all of the Protestant sects, the RC Church and the Orthodox Church) recognized Arianism and Socinianism to be heresies.”
Which raises the question, what is an “official Christian denomination”?
It strikes me that creeds came into vogue following the union of church and state under Constantine.
I’d think that should be enough to make them suspect at a site like Positive Liberty. Indeed, its somewhat surprising that Jonathan would insist on defining Christianity in terms of creedal pronouncements emanating from the exercise of imperial power.
Be that as it may, what if Arianism and Socinianism are “heresies” according to the doctrines of Constantinian councils. Are not Arians and Socinians, then, merely heretical Christians? So it seems to me.
Or does embracing a “heresy” make one not a Christian? So that a “heretical Christian” is a meaningless contradiction in terms?
And if that is so, can any be Christians but Catholics?
I think, Jonathan, that you are absolutely correct to say that some who insist that America is a “Christian nation” employ narrow definitions of Christianity that exclude people like John Adams and Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. But I cannot agree that Adams and Jefferson were for that reason not Christians.
And I’m more than a little surprised to find you standing, on this point of theology, with the very folks whom I thought you opposed.
May peace be upon you!
Eric Alan Isaacson
Eric. Let me try this again. Jon Rowe is trying to demonstrate that, by the Christian Nation crowds standards, most of the Founders were not orthodox. This puts paid to the notion that this was some kind of Christian Coalition paradise before the liberals came along, without going to the extremes that some of today’s secularists do of trying to deny the presence of any Christianity whatsoever.
In comparison to Jon Rowe, you are unlikely to find a fairer, more open-minded guy on this subject. And what he’s saying has no bearing whatsoever on who (or is it “whom”) he thinks qualifies for the beaten and battered title of “Christian.”
You also wrote…
That’s probably not true. Many reputable historians believe the Apostle’s Creed came into being during the 2nd Century.
And, from the start, the Christians already had a well-established pattern of meeting to reason their way to a decision on matters affecting the community of believers. See Acts 4:31-37, 6:2, 11:2-3, and chapter 15. It is in Acts 15 that one can read an account of the very first Church Council in Jerusalem. From these meetings, they would issue statements. The Nicene Creed, and other creeds that followed, were the work product of Councils.
And if it were relevant… I would say that the Apostle’s Creed minimally defines Christian, and anything short of that is not orthodox. And it is to that which I assent, as a summation or definition of Christian, provided catholic is spelled with a small “c” at the beginning.
Jim,
I understand that Jonathan is challenging the “Christian Nation” crowd. I just think he concedes to much if he allows them to define what a “Christian” is.
I think that the “Christian Nation” crowd is theologically wrong, historically wrong, and definitionally wrong.
My difference with Jonathan goes to what appears to me to be his willingness to accept their definition of what it means to be a “Christian.” I think it enough to say that according to their definition three or four of our first six presidents were not “Christians,” without endorsing that definition.
I think we all can agree that Jonathan is one of the fairest and most open-minded people we could ever hope to meet. That we can quibble over semantics won’t change that.
As for creeds, were they critical to Christianity, I’d think that Jesus would have articulated a creed or two. I’ll let historians debate the origins of the Apostles’ creed. I think it remains true “that creeds [I did use the plural] came into vogue following the union of church and state under Constantine.”
Dave Trowbridge wrote above that as a Christian Quaker, he is “more concerned with orthopraxy, as defined by Jesus, than with orthodoxy, as defined by the church,” and that “most early Christians knew nothing of many of the doctrines in the Nicene Creed.” I tend to agree with him. I really don’t think that the creeds define what it is to be a Christian.
Eric
This post is off the front page, so this will be my final comment.
Orthopraxy tends to yield the theology one wants to have, and assumes there is no “right” or “ideal” answer. It’s tendency is to treat the symptoms instead of the disease, to pay attention to the body and forget the heart.
Grace impacts, transforms, and empowers the recipient. Right thinking leads to right action. In the presence of many counselors one finds wisdom, plus the community leads me to accountability and to partnerships with others that are differently gifted than I am (the concept of ‘”the Body of Christ”). Theology is not a Lone Ranger affair.
The problem with too much of orthodoxy is that those most concerned about it so seldom end up at orthopraxy. Both are needed. Oh, that more Christians would take the words of Jesus seriously.
Even Jefferson would be proud if they did that.