Following on my previous post . . .

Again, the nub of my argument in the post that touched off this discussion was as follows:

Heretical doctrine is not merely doctrine which is in error, but doctrine which is in error on the core matters of the Christian faith, in such a way that the doctrine fundamentally threatens the integrity of the gospel message; it’s a significant departure from what C. S. Lewis called ‘mere Christianity,’ nothing else, and nothing less.

James Altena, another of my interlocutors, considered this a nefarious statement:

First, this substantially subscribes to the infamous PECUSA Bp. Righter trial assertion of “core doctrine”—which was, of course, a category invented precisely to provide a green light to all sorts of heresies, as the sequel has shown.

Interestingly, he followed that up by contradicting himself:

No orthodox thinker denies that certain doctrines are more critical to faith (in the doctrinal sense) that others.

Thanks for conceding my point.  I’m not sure why he felt the need to call it “infamous” and “a category invented precisely to provide a green light to all sorts of heresies” first, but whatever works, I guess.  Of course, having called my point orthodox, he then proceeded to return to attacking it, charging me with two fallacies.  First,

It implicitly presumes that some doctrines are not inter-related but independent, and therefore that an erroneous or heretical doctrine can be quarantined from its effects on other doctrines. Thus, a lower-level error or heresy does not necessarily imply a high (or deeper) level error, or else cannot spread more deeply and lethally. But heresy is like gangrene—it spreads, and penetrates more deeply, so that one goes from losing some flesh, to losing appendages, to losing limbs, and finally to losing life itself.

I have several responses here.  One, there is no such presumption.  All doctrines are interrelated, as in fact all our beliefs about everything are interrelated.  The presumption, rather, is that while theoretically, a small theological error (such as, I believe, the refusal to baptize infants) could spread throughout our theology and poison the whole thing, practically, that rarely happens.  Such errors do not directly challenge the “doctrines [that] are more critical to faith,” and we either do not perceive the indirect challenge they pose or find some line of argument that convinces us that there is no challenge, and so in fact the error does not spread at all.

Two, the difference between doctrines which are merely errant and those which are heretical is precisely between those which do not generally spread, because they do not directly contradict the essential tenets of the Christian faith (to borrow a phrase), and those which do.

Three, the alternative to this position is to declare us all lousy rotten heretics and have done with it—or, if you’re arrogant enough to think yourself pure, to take the Roger Williams route and conclude that the only possible pure church is one that only includes you.  None of us is free from theological error, and so if any error is sufficient to be called heresy, then none of us can escape the label.  Of course, once you get to that point, the word becomes meaningless, and you need a new one to describe the errors which actually do destroy people.

Second, Altena contends,

It implicitly presumes that traditionalists believe (contrary to I Cor. 13) that doctrinal accuracy alone suffices for salvation apart from charity. Or, to put it a bit differently, that they hold faith to be fundamentally doctrinal, rather than primarily a matter of trust [pistis]. In fact, traditionalists actually hold instead that adherence to orthodoxy is properly an act of willing submission, obedience, and humility, which is a sign of such trust.

Again, there is no such assumption; in this case, I don’t even see how he thinks this logically follows.  As such, I’m really not sure how to respond to this one except to say that some traditionalists are guilty of that error, and some aren’t.

Moving on, he writes,

Second, this fails to distinguish between heresy and theological error. Heresy is knowing and intentional rejection of orthodoxy; theological error is unknowing or unintentional rejection. Hence, while all theological error may imperil salvation to a greater or lesser degree, it is heresy that ensures it—not due to the magnitude or centrality of the error, but rather due to the sin of pride involved in the very manner in which the heresy is held and asserted.

This is purely a doozy.  By that standard, straightforwardly interpreted, the only heretics are those who take the stance of Richard III:  “I am determined to prove a villain/And hate the idle pleasures of these days.”  Only those who are actively trying to be heretics are heretics—no one else is.  That would be an extraordinarily generous stance.

Of course, it seems safe to me to say that that isn’t what Altena means at all.  I think Tyler Dawn cut to the core of this one:  given his previous statements, it seems to me that what he really means is “Heresy is knowing and intentional rejection of orthodoxy according to my definition of orthodoxy.”  Those who hold different positions merely because they haven’t had the chance to agree with him get off with the lesser label of “theological error.”  He may accuse others of pride, but I think he shows some of his own at this point.

Continuing on with Altena’s arguments, he says,

Third, a heretical view of divine anthropology indeed “fundamentally threatens the integrity of the gospel message” because it does imperil salvation.

I would of course agree with that, aside from his poor grammar.  I simply deny that the line is where he says it is.

Mr. Harrison speciously tries here to invoke the support of C. S. Lewis.

No, I was merely giving attribution to the quote and concept.  Academic politeness, nothing more.

He should go back and read Lewis’ essay, “Priestesses in the Church?”, in which Lewis made it as evident as possible that he did regard women’s ordination as being, to use Mr. Harrison’s own term, one of the “core matters of the Christian faith,” the adoption of which would have as its inevitable and necessary end a reversion to paganism.

That’s fine.  I freely admit that I haven’t read the essay, but I have no trouble believing that Lewis took that position.  I also have no trouble believing that if that’s the case, then he was mistaken.  By Altena’s logic, I should now proceed to declare Lewis a heretic—but I won’t.

Finally, Altena contends that

the fundamental division reflected here is that which I have termed essentialism vs. functionalism. For those who may wish to brave it, a lengthy essay I wrote upon the topic was posted several months ago.

Having read the essay (I respect the Baylys), I think there’s a lot of truth in it.  I disagree with his concept of “essentialism” to this extent:  I believe it is not “a divinely created and endowed unique inherent constitution” that “both endows it with an inherent and ineradicable value, and intrinsically determines its capacities and relations to other things, and thus orders them all to their proper goals or ends”; I believe, rather, that it is God who endows, determines, and orders.  It may seem a small point, and for the purposes of his argument, it is; I do think it’s a telling one as to his mindset and approach, however.  I also think that to the extent that his grand philosophical argument connects to the practical issue of gender roles, those connections are asserted rather than argued, and that what he’s arguing against is a caricature of gender egalitarianism that no one (that I know of, anyway) who holds that position would recognize.  It’s easy to argue against people if you don’t care what they actually believe.

Finally, we have Kamilla’s comment, which I must confess I found irresistably amusing.  Her criticism provoked me to two thoughts:  first, that she’s obviously never seen me argue; and second, that since I was working off a comment by Mark Driscoll, she essentially accused him of contributing to “the feminication of discourse.”  The irony is astounding.  Kamilla appears to be one who believes that the only alternative to “just be nice” (something for which I did not, do not, and will never argue) is to unleash one’s anger at everything bad.  Beyond pointing out that one can in fact say something “without hesitation . . . firmly, forcefully and leaving the listener in no doubt” while also doing so gently, lovingly, and in a spirit of sorrow rather than anger, I will simply direct her to James:

let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God.

As a coda, let me respond to TUD’s comments on the first part of this post:

Pastor Harrison, do you consider your response pastoral when you write “poor crippled excuse for an elipsis”?

Actually, yes, I do.  A few raps over the knuckles like that from his teachers might have taught him to be kinder to the language; leaving people with a poor command of English does them no favors.  One rap over the knuckles to me for misspelling “ellipsis.”

I’m just pointing out the unspoken presupposition on your part. Furthermore, there are some Christians who don’t accept a hierarchy of doctrines.

It wasn’t unspoken; and I’ve known of very few Christians who don’t accept any hierarchy of doctrines, whatever they may say.  As far as I can tell, they’re about as common as liberals who are actually as tolerant as they claim to be.

You think that egalitarianism doesn’t merit the charge of heresy. Dr. Hutchens does. Ergo, there’s no consensual agreement.

I believe the proper response here is “Duh!” Obviously there’s no consensual agreement—that would be why we’re disagreeing.  The point is, the fact that we’re disagreeing doesn’t mean neither of us is right—and therefore, equally, the fact that we’re disagreeing doesn’t in and of itself mean that I’m wrong.

If I understand your argument correctly, you’re saying that only doctrines which merit something along the lines of “Let him be accursed” deserves to be called a heresy? Is that your position?

My position is that Paul clearly does not regard all false doctrines as equally serious errors, though he regards all of them as equally false.

That’s one of your major problems. You’re not drawing on the wisdom of Christians of all ages in discussing this issue.

I didn’t say I’m not drawing on their wisdom; actually, I explicitly said the opposite.  What I said is that I don’t consider myself constrained by stare decisis.

Well, with all due respect, I must also confess to being rather underwhelmed by your arguments in your original post and in this one as well.

He is of course entitled to his opinion.

A week and a half or so ago, I put up a post offering a few thoughts on the right use of the word “heresy,” riffing on a comment of Mark Driscoll’s at GCNC and interacting with an editorial by S. M. Hutchens in the latest Touchstone.  As I expected, it met with no particular response—initially.  It appears, however, that someone (who disagreed with me) started e-mailing it around, and a few days ago, comments started popping up—including, interestingly, a response from Dr. Hutchens himself.  I’m rather surprised he took the time to answer a no-name blogger like me, but it’s always gratifying to be taken seriously.

Nevertheless, I still don’t agree with his position; and I must confess myself somewhat underwhelmed by the arguments raised against mine.  For one thing, with regard to the question of whether it’s appropriate to label egalitarianism a heresy, I’m struck by the complete absence of any biblical or biblical-theological arguments on the point at all.  The argumentation is purely at the level of systematic theology, and essentially consists of assertions as to the inevitable negative consequences in other areas of an egalitarian position.  This is problematic, at best.  I agree that there is value in arguing at this level, for certain purposes; I do not, however, consider such arguments sufficient in and of themselves for proving the correctness or falsity of a given doctrine.  They may serve a useful purpose as part of such a proof, but our doctrines should not be grounded in our theological systems.  They should, rather, be grounded in Scripture.  Biblical theology is necessarily prior to any truly Christian systematic theology (and exegesis and hermeneutics are necessarily prior to biblical theology).

The truth of the matter is, of course, that neither Dr. Hutchens nor any other of my interlocutors feels any need at all to actually defend their view on this point; they simply take it as a given and assert it.  Then, as noted, they proceed to offer arguments as to why, given that egalitarianism is false (which I do not grant, but which they assume), it is necessary to label it as a heresy.  Should any of them cycle back to offer any actual argument for their assumption that this position is in fact false, we can discuss that; for now, since they have opted to argue not with Scripture but with logic-chopping, I will seek to answer them in their chosen terms.

The nub of my response to Dr. Hutchens’ editorial was that error in one’s view of male and female roles is not necessarily serious enough to merit a charge of heresy (and specifically, that the egalitarian position as such does not merit that charge).  At one point, I wrote,

Heretical doctrine is not merely doctrine which is in error, but doctrine which is in error on the core matters of the Christian faith, in such a way that the doctrine fundamentally threatens the integrity of the gospel message.

An individual who’s chosen the handle “Truth Unites… and Divides” (henceforth TUD, if only so I can avoid retyping that poor crippled excuse for an elipsis) had four comments.

#1. The argument assumes a hierarchy of doctrines.

Yes, it does.  There’s nothing terribly non-standard about that.  As I noted, the very idea of “mere Christianity” requires at the least the idea that some doctrines are essential and some are non-essential.  Another example of this would be the line (which I’ve seen attributed to many people, so I won’t credit it to anyone until I can see the primary source) “In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.”

#2. Assuming a hierarchy, there is no consensus as to what are the “1st-order” doctrines which merit what you say deserves the rightful label of heresy.

True, but not on point.  There is no consensus on national economic policy either, but that doesn’t mean that all national economic policies are equally likely to produce prosperity.  Similarly, the absence of complete consensus on what doctrines are first-order (notice, I say complete consensus; I think there is consensus on many if not most of them) doesn’t invalidate the argument that some are and some are not.

#3. What Scriptural support do you offer for your argument that only aberrant teaching which negatively impacts salvation rightfully deserves the label of heresy?

For starters, look at St. Paul.  In 1 Corinthians 7, he clearly sees the views of some in the Corinthian church with regard to sexual abstinence as errant, and so he corrects them.  He just as clearly does not see those errors as equal in significance to those of the Judaizers who were leading the Galatian church astray.  It’s only in Galatians 1 that he says of anyone teaching a contrary position, “Let him be accursed”; he doesn’t feel the need to do so in 1 Corinthians 7.

#4. What support from Church history do you offer for your argument that only aberrant teaching which negatively impacts salvation rightfully deserves the label of heresy?

I draw on the wisdom of Christians of all ages, but as a Protestant, I don’t feel the need for support from church history (and yes, the small “c” is intentional).

Turning to Dr. Hutchens’ first comment, he wrote,

I have been thinking and writing on this subject for years now, and it was clear to me early on that the “anthropological heresy” of egalitarianism necessitated alterations in trinitarian doctrine—that one could not misconstrue the relation between the sexes created in the divine image without also attacking its theological root in the doctrine of God.

It’s clear to me that he’s wrong.  That is of course an utterly unfounded assertion; but then, so is yours, since the following actually doesn’t qualify as support:

If one will examine the current literature on the subject, he will see that now, indeed, that is just the place where the debate has moved.

Correlation does not equal causation, as anyone who shares my long-suffering fate as a Seattle Mariners fan can tell you; if it did, the expensive free agents currently mucking up our rotation would have pitched much better for us.  It seems to me this says more about the way that complementarians have argued this issue since George W. Knight III’s book (since if you frame an argument in a given set of terms long enough, people will tend to fall into responding to you in those terms) than it does about the actual logical necessity of such arguments.

As for subordinationism, it seems to me that it depends what is meant by the term.  Clearly, any position that holds that the Son and the Spirit are ontologically subordinate, are lesser in being than the Father, is heretical; just as clearly, there is logical subordination, as the Son is begotten and the Spirit proceeds (with some dispute as to from whom).  As well, Christ repeatedly asserts his functional subordination to the Father during his time on earth.  Thus we have two poles marking off the range of positions that can be called biblical; between those poles, there have been various positions held throughout church history, some of which have been labeled or have claimed the label “subordinationism.”

It’s important to note that there has not been one fixed position on this point throughout church history.  Dr. Hutchens, in complaining that “Egalitarian theologians are now insisting that the doctrine of the Church is, and always has been, that there is perfect equality in the Trinity, not just in regard to the divine essence, but the relations between the persons,” is disingenuously implying that this position was invented for the sole and sneaky purpose of finding a way to counter those virtuous complementarians’ arguments.  This simply isn’t true.  On my read, this is the position held by Athanasius and laid out in the Athanasian Creed, for starters.  For a more recent example, take Louis Berkhof, who might be considered the exemplary theologian of the last century of the Dutch Reformed tradition in America.  In his 1938 Systematic Theology (reprinted by Eerdmans in a single volume with his 1932 Introductory Volume to Systematic Theology), the ascription “to the Father [of] a certain pre-eminence over the other persons, in order, dignity, and power” is referenced as an “erroneous construction” associated with the Arminians.  Need it be said that Dr. Berkhof, writing in 1938 as a professor at an institution which isn’t exactly friendly to egalitarian thinking 70 years later, wasn’t arguing on behalf of the feminist agenda?

The irony of Dr. Hutchens’ argument here is that he labels egalitarians as people who “like Arius, [have] attacked Christian doctrine at its root”—on what grounds?  On the grounds that they have taken the same position on the relationships within the Trinity as Athanasius.  After all, it was Arius who was defending the subordinationist side in that argument, though of course he took it well beyond mere subordinationism; and it was Athanasius who held the position that the assertion of relational inequality among the persons of the Trinity must ultimately lead to Arianism.

In any event, one may argue for an eternal relational hierarchy among the persons of the Trinity and appeal both to the Church Fathers and (more fundamentally) to Scripture in support of this position; one may also argue for eternal relational equality among the persons of the Trinity (marked of course by functional subordination—as for instance the subordination of the Son to the Father during his time on earth) and appeal both to the Church Fathers and (more fundamentally) to Scripture in support of this position.  Both positions, it seems to me, are at least defensible.  One of them is of course wrong, but I have yet to hear a convincing argument that either one destroys our doctrine of God and thus “attacks Christian doctrine at its root.”

And even if I did—and I’m willing to listen—I don’t buy the argument that this applies to the disagreement between gender complementarians and gender egalitarians.  (Note:  I’m not using the term “gender” here because I believe it’s a social construct, but rather because I agree with C. S. Lewis that it is in fact the fundamental reality of which biological sex is the physical expression.)  I know Dr. Knight argues the connection between a belief in a relational hierarchy in the Trinity and a complementarian view of gender roles, and I know he’s not the only one, but I just don’t find it convincing, either as an interpretation of Scripture or as a claimed logical necessity.  I think the root of this is a misconstrued and overdetermined interpretation of Genesis 1:27 and what it means to be created in the image of God—an interpretation which is tone-deaf to what that phrase actually meant in the ancient world as opposed to what we can define it to mean.

At this point, given the length of this post already and the fact that I inadvertently hit “publish” not too long ago, I’m publishing it as the first part of my response.  The comments of other folks in that thread will be addressed in a follow-on post.