“The Chief Task is to Assess the Protestant Adjustment of Traditional Scholastic Categories in the Light of The Reformation”

A Clearer Understanding of the Meaning of the Reformation Itself This entry concludes the section of Richard Muller’s work under the heading, “Doctrine and Method in the Era of Early Orthodoxy (ca. 1565-1618-1640)”. What’s been most notable for me, in publishing selections from Muller, is to notice the continuities of thought through the Reformation period. …

New: Dr. Carl Trueman Lectures: “The Reformation”

Westminster Theological Seminary (WTS) has just recently released a new series of iTunesU Lectures on The Reformation. The upload date on the series was 9/29/14, so this is pretty recent. For anyone who’s interested in learning more on the Reformation at a seminary level, this is a great—and free—resource that you can take advantage of.

Philosophical Issues and Developments in the Post-Reformation Era, 1

Philosophy was an “add-on” to theology for the post-Reformation writers. It was “an aid to learning” (“ancilla”) but it did not contain the substantive material that was to be considered when evaluating “theology proper” (i.e., issues surrounding the Doctrine of God, etc.). In other instances, it was found, some philosophies were outright hostile to Christianity. …

Post-Reformation Systematization and Continuities

It was one thing for the Reformers to rebel against the abuses of Rome; it was quite another thing to put together a cohesive program of what the church ought rightly to be in the world. To this end, the generations of thinkers following the Reformation looked to other disciplines. So, not only was “systematization” …

The Rise of Post-Reformation Systematics

I’ve been working through Richard Muller’s “Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics”. Some time ago, Muller was discussing the rise of “a revised scholasticism”, “as a result, not of doctrinal change, but of the participation of [Protestant] theological faculties in the academic culture of the age”, and as “a more suitable systematic vehicle in and through which to …

Heiko Oberman on Historical Method

One of the reasons why a historian may be suspicious of the use of the term Forerunner, while operating freely and frequently with its Latin equivalent “antecedent,” is its possible causative connotation. It might seem to imply a concept of history which presupposes determination by a pre-established divine plan or by its secular equivalent, immanent …

The Continuity of “the Church” Through the Reformation

What is “the church”? Roman Catholic dogma about “the Church” leads to a misunderstanding of what Christ’s “church” actually consists of. For Roman Catholicism, Dogma #1 frequently seems to be “The Roman Catholic Church is God’s Great Gift to Mankind” – see this first sentence in the “Dogmatic Constitution on the Church”, Lumen Gentium: Christ …

More Definitions of Terms

As I continue to work through Richard Muller’s “Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics”, I’ll likely be stumbling across a lot of names and concepts that simply aren’t familiar to 21st century believers. So it’s good that Muller helpfully explains a lot of these terms. A comment is also necessary here concerning the terms used throughout the study. …

Moving forward while retaining ties to the past

I’m working through Richard Muller’s “Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics”. That’s a daunting title, to be sure, but given how these several generations of theologians (from say, 1550 to 1750) worked to codify the theologies of the Reformation, they were probably some of the best Christian thinkers in the history of the church. It will pay dividends …

“Codifiers and perpetuators” of the Reformation

I’ve recently acquired an electronic copy (yes, I paid for it – one of the benefits of working as much as I do these days is that I can afford to buy all the books that I’ve wanted) of Richard Muller’s “Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics”. Since this was expensive, and many people don’t have access to …