Category: R2K Virus (Radical Two Kingdom Theology)

“When we come to the Republication Paradigm, merit is being defined and used differently than in the Westminster Standards.”

Elam, Van Kooten, Bergquist
Moses and Merit; A Critique of the Klinean Doctrine of Republication

1.) The reason that merit is being defined and used differently than in the Westminster standards is because the whole idea of “merit,” as handled by the Klinean Republication lads, is resting in a different worldview from those who wrote the Westminster standards. Words are worldview dependent and the worldview of the Escondido Theology is a different worldview than the Westminster divines and so their definition of merit is as different as the worldview that they own.

2.) Concretely speaking, merit is different in the Escondido Theology because, following Kline, the Escondido theology no longer is taking into consideration the ontological divide between man as creature and God as Creator. Because the Westminster West lads view merit only covenantally there is little understanding in their position to see the inability whereby Adam could gain, even in the prelapsarian covenant, a strict merit. Adam could never have earned a strict merit due to the ontological distance between the Creator and the creature.

Adam gained merit in the prelapsarian covenant only due to God’s condescension. God’s condescension allowed Adam to accrue “covenant merit.” However, covenant merit could never be strict merit because of the ontological divide between God and Adam. The only one who could ever gain strict merit was the Lord Christ; and that only because there was not ontological divide between the Father and Son. The Escondido theology severely minimizes this ontological distance between God and man and so does not render justice to the idea of God condescending to man.

The sum of it all is that the changes made in the Escondido Republication Theology goes a long way towards giving a facelift to the Reformed faith so that it no longer is what it once was. You simply cannot rearrange and redefine central concepts of the Reformed faith without sending ripple effects through the whole theological structure.

Over at this site,

http://www.visionandvalues.org/2013/04/thoughts-on-same-sex-marriage-part-iii/#sthash.0PuXIRyC.dpuf

R2K fanboy T. David Gordon, a year ago or so, had a go at same sex marriage. Someone sent me this article written by the Religion and Greek Prof at Grove City College. This article demonstrate why I did not send my children to “Christian colleges.” Why spend your hard earned money to have your children indoctrinated in this dreck?

You may not know this but T. David Gordon (hereafter TDG) is the chap who once said of standard vanilla Christianity,

“(it is) the Bible-thumping error par excellence,” and the doctrine of the “never to be wise.”

TDG also said once of the Covenant of Grace that he “pitied the poor Israelites who suffered under the Mosaic administration.”

TDG gets points for boldness but has points subtracted for being slow.

Anyway, in the piece that follows, TDG tries to convince us that the same sex marriage issue should be approached as a civil issue and not as a religious issue.

TDG titles his article,

Thoughts on Same-Sex Marriage, Part III: The Issue Is Civil, Not Religious

Bret responds,

By what standard is TDG determining that the issue of same sex marriage is civil and not religious? What other standard could he use to come to that conclusion except a religious standard? Something is informing TDG that same sex marriage is not a religious issue. I contend that it is TDG’s religion that is the standard informing him that same sex marriage is not a religious issue.

TDG writes,

“Parties on each side of the same-sex marriage issue often interject religion into the discussion. In my opinion, this is unhelpful. The manifest intention of the First Amendment is that the majority may not impose its religious preferences on the minority, but permit the minority the same due exercise as the majority enjoys. If the determination of whose union the state must recognize were a religious matter, then plainly, Mormons could still be polygamous, and the state would be obliged to certify their polygamous unions. In plain point of historical fact, the Utah compromise proves that the question of whose unions the state will recognize is not a religious decision; it is a civil decision, which the state determines according to its own interests.”

This is a non sequitur which commits the is / ought fallacy but lets pretend it doesn’t and play along with TDG.

1.) TDG interjects his religion into the discussion by saying that interjecting other religions (besides the one he champions of course) is unhelpful concerning the issue of same sex marriage. TDG desire the religion of “no religion” to have the final say.

2.) To take the 1st amendment the way TDG is taking it is to argue that all minority religious preference immoralities must be protected since that is what the 1st amendment promises. Would TDG say that the 1st amendment supports smoking peyote for religious reasons? Would TDG say that the 1st amendment protects the minority religious practice of “Suttee?” Would TDG say that the 1st amendment protects the religious minority preference of child sacrifice in a religious ceremony? By TDG “logic” shouldn’t these minority religious practices have the same due exercise of religion as the majority enjoys?

3.) TDG misses the fact that it was precisely because polygamous marriage was a religious matter that the FEDS said “no” to Mormon polygamy. In point of fact, in the polygamy case the FEDS imposed upon the religious minority of Utah their religious preference in favor of the majority religious preference.

4.) In plain point of historical fact,

a.) The Utah decision was no compromise.
b.) The Utah decision is proof positive that even a broken clock is right twice a day
c.) The Utah decision proves that religion is an inescapable category

5.) How does the State determine what is in its own interest without some kind of religious standard? Note this is important. TDG insists that the standard used by the State is a cost-benefit analysis. But one must still ask, ‘what standard will be used, by the State, to assess the cost benefit analysis to which TDG appeals? What religious- Theological presuppositions will be in play in order to determine the cost-benefit analysis?

TDG writes,

“If the issue were a religious issue, it would be difficult to account for the prevalence of the civil recognition of marriage in so many religiously diverse nations. Secular nations such as France and the former Soviet Union recognized marital unions; Buddhist and Hindu nations recognize marital unions; Islamic countries recognize marital unions. If recognizing opposite-sex unions were merely an expression of religious faith, why would Joseph Stalin’s USSR have done so? Why would France do so? State recognition of certain unions is a civil issue, regardless of whatever religious (or irreligious) opinions exist regarding those unions themselves. And a great variety of differing governments have recognized the union of a single man and a single woman for some reason that must, therefore, be non-religious.”

1.) It is not difficult in the slightest to “account for the prevalence of the civil recognition of marriage in so many religiously diverse nations.” It is simply a matter of understanding that no pagan worldview completely cleanses itself of all residual tenets of Biblical Christianity.

2.) TDG needs to do some historical work looking at what happened to marriage and family at the beginning of the great Soviet Union experiment before it reversed course. He could start by looking up the name of Alexandra Kollontai and go from there. He could discover that religious reasons moved the Soviet Union to originally seek to break up the idea of marriage and family and that the failure of reorganizing marriage and family consistent with Christ hating religion forced them to give up on their religious project of redefining marriage and family. But then TDG, being a religion guy, wouldn’t know anything about the history of religious communism.

3.) The fact that a great number of pagan States have recognized opposite sex unions no more proves that such recognition is irreligious then the fact that a great number of pagan states have recognized dog licenses proves the state is one big dog kennel. The fact that men and States never act completely consistently with their God hating worldviews is not that difficult to understand.

TDG writes,

“I suspect the primary consideration that has motivated such a diversity of states to recognize heterosexual unions between one man and one woman is because this is the ordinary biological way in which new taxpayers (and soldiers, etc.) are created. Governments do not (yet?) have the power to create new humans to pay taxes in the future and to participate more broadly in the culture. They are dependent upon the biological union of males and females to secure a national progeny, and, for this reason, they recognize and protect such unions by issuing licenses. Now, there may be a host of religious reasons for being happy that states do this; but the states do not do so for religious reasons. Secular as well as non-secular states do so for the common reason that this is the ordinary way in which new citizens enter the state and are reared to maturity. That is, to put it crassly: the state has an interest in preserving and promoting the biological unions by which, ordinarily, new citizens enter the public arena.”

Bret responds,

1.) In this quote TDG takes up the fundamental principle of legal positivism which is that the good is what the state does and a just law is whatever the state decrees.

2.) The fact that many states might do what Christians want them to do, yet not for the reason Christians want them to do so should convince Christians that this is not a religious discussion? Hello Bueller?

3.) If this reasoning was correct then the State most certainly should, on the basis of a cost benefit analysis, at least allow polygamy. After all polygamy can produce large numbers of taxpayers. Further, States, on the theorizing of TDG should pass laws that require marriages to be voided if there is some kind of sterilization that prohibits child bearing. Remember … this is all cost-benefit analysis.

4.) There is no such thing as a “secular” State if by that one suggests that a State rules from nowhere and from no religious disposition.

5.) TDG has the State recognizing marriage for the purpose of self-sustainment. The problem here is that the desire for self sustainment is a religious consideration. A religious consideration that is driven by a Christian (religious) presupposition that life (sustainment) is good and that death is bad.

TDG writes,

“We would do well to remind ourselves: We are not discussing whether consenting adults may have sexual relations as they wish; that matter has been settled (in the United States) since the Texas Supreme Court decision. We are discussing which unions the state ought to recognize. I am suggesting that, unless and until the state can procure a future progeny by another means than the union of a male and female, it would be imprudent for it not to recognize, and therefore protect, this particular union. And, I further suggest that the conversation we ought to be having is this: What similar benefit does state recognition of same-sex unions bring to the state, which would warrant the clerical and judicial costs to the state?”

Bret responds,

1.) So because Lawrence vs. Texas gave us a illegal law the matter is now settled?

2.) So, if the state could suddenly discover better ways to produce progeny for its own survival therefore the State would have a legitimate grounds in order to recognize marriage between a man and his cow? Paging Todd Bordow.

3.) TDG is taking us here from “Has not the Lord said,” to, “Has not the State said.”

TDG wrote,

“I myself remain open to a convincing conversation here, but I do not hear or read anyone making it. It should not be difficult to determine what it currently costs the individual states (or their aggregate) in clerical and judicial expenses to recognize those marriages that they now recognize. Nor should it be difficult to calculate, therefore, the “per-union” cost to the state recognizing unions. The conversation should then turn to the “return” the state would likely get for this expense.”

Bret responds,

1.) Am I to take from this that if a cost-benefit analysis could be made which would reveal that it was profitable for the State to turn me into Soylent Green it would be acceptable to do so?

2.) This is pragmatism and utilitarianism in its most ugly visage. Do we need to enter into arguments that has been used to overturn pragmatism?

3.) Why is it so wrong to thing that the conversation should turn to what God thinks?

TDG seems to come from the Libertarian “axiom” that one cannot legislate morality, but the whole, “it’s a civil issue, not a religious issue” is a self-defeating stance, for that in and of itself is legislation of a morality. There are no “irreligious” issues and because there are no irreligious issues there is no separating law from religion.

In the end what TDG wants is that all the gods be seen as equal thus receiving equal protection under the law. So, we ask T. Dave, “what entity will make sure that all the gods will receive equal protection under the law? What entity will make sure none of the gods get a leg up on the other gods?

The answer TDG offers us is that the God state of course will make sure all the gods are equal in the common realm. No god is given preference. Decisions are made via a cost-benefit analysis. The God state thus becomes the God of the competing gods and so the God state is God over all. The God state will make sure the the God of the Bible is restricted in the exercise of His dominion. All must serve and bow before the God state. Re-read TDG article and note that the civil realm is ordered according to the desires of the State. What else is that but acknowledging that the State is the God in the civil realm?

Because this is so, we do currently have a Theonomic order. The State is the God we serve and the State, while insisting its law comes from nowhere in terms of religion, is actually giving us a law order of Humanism.

TDG, as a professing Christian, supports this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl9_cWxpLxY

“Although we acknowledge that certain points of similarity between the covenant of works and the Mosaic covenant can be found in previous writers, none of them argue a works-merit formula for Israel as a “corporate Adam”, as Kline and his disciples propose. Instead, in our view, the evidence shows that Meredith Kline is the architect of the contemporary Republication Paradigm described above.”

Elam, Van Kooten, Berquist
Merit and Moses; A Critique of the Klinean Doctrine of Republication — pg. 37

The importance of this quote lies in the demonstration that the kind of Klinean Republication that is so commonly pushed today is as completely innovative and novel as … well, …. as completely innovative and novel as the whole R2K project for which it serves as the theological foundation. We could be polite and say that this Escondido Theology is both “good and original,” but we’d have to press on to qualify by noting that what is good about Escondido Republication is not original and what is original about it is not good.

One has to understand that this innovative doctrine (this theology with absolutely ZERO historical legs) could well completely eviscerate what little remains of the Reformed Churches witness in the West if it is not stopped.

Our assessment, in a nutshell, is as follows: TLNF’s (Book — The Law is not of Faith) doctrine of republication represents a reactionary pendulum swing against the views of Norman Shepherd and the Federal Vision (FV) theology. Although advocates of the republication view properly recognize many of the deviant formulations in the Shepherd/FV theology, many of the alternatives they propose are also problematic, and warrant careful evaluation….

In the estimation of TLNF, the OPC needs the one and true remedy for ridding the denomination of the bad fruits of “Shepherd-ism” (in all its varieties), by laying the proverbial axe to its root in “Murray-ism.” Of course, according to TLNF, that axe is the doctrine of republication. However, it will become clearer how the republication
viewpoint, following Meredith G. Kline, is itself a reactionary theological pendulum swing away from the plumb line of the Confession….

Kline’s Reactionary Theology

As noted above, Kline and the authors of TLNF are correct to point to dangerous imbalances in the theology of Norman Shepherd and FV. But is it possible that even as Shepherd and FV represented a pendulum swing away from the WCF in one direction, Kline’s reaction to it might constitute a swing in another? We may identify three components of Kline’s teaching and writings intended to counteract the teaching of Shepherd and FV. In our view, these components also swing wide of the plumb line of the Westminster Standards.

Elam, Van Kooten, Berquist
Merit and Moses; A Critique of the Klinean Doctrine of Republication, pg. 3, 16, 17

So just how did Kline’s theology end up being a reactionary pendulum swing to Shepherd and putatively Murray?

Well, what Shepherd did was to fold grace into law so that there was not enough discontinuity between grace and law with the consequence that the covenant of works was seen as a gracious covenant, on the other hand, er hand went all reactionary by folding law into grace and strangely enough also found himself, like his nemesis Shepherd, with not enough discontinuity between law and grace with the consequence that the covenant of Grace is described as “being a covenant of grace except when it’s not.” Shepherd made a legal covenant gracious. Kline has made a gracious covenant legal.

For Shepherd’s folding of grace into the legal covenant the result was a confusion of faithfulness and faith for justification. For Kline’s folding of law into the gracious covenant the result is a confusion of law and Gospel for the Old Testament saints in the Mosaic administration of the covenant of grace. If Shepherd make the mistake of making the Covenant of works, gracious, Kline has made the mistake of making the covenant of grace, legal so that the covenant of grace in the Mosaic covenant is described as one that includes “works.” In Kline’s covenant of Grace one can earn merit, via law-keeping, to stay in the land. Shepherd and Kline agree that law and grace must be folded into each other. The only difference is that Shepherd folded grace into law (Covenant of works is seen as being gracious) while Kline folded law into grace (Gracious Mosaic covenant is seen as being legal).

We continue with our “Recapitulation blurb” series. Keep in mind here that what is being exposed as ruinous is not the idea of Mosaic Covenant Recapitulation in general, but rather what is being exposed as ruinous is the Mosaic Covenant Recapitulation that is coming from the pens of men like the authors of “The Law Is Not Of Faith.” Many of these men have connections to Westminster Calif. Seminary and to Dr. Meredith Kline specifically.

Our Republication Ruin quote of the day,

Note again what is being claimed: the idea of a works principle in the Mosaic covenant is a necessary teaching which is integrally connected to the doctrine of justification. The term “integral” refers to something that is essential and necessary to a thing’s completeness—that which serves as a constituent or foundational part of something else. In connecting the two doctrines in this way, the editors are asserting that the republication doctrine is thus essential and necessary for the completeness of justification….

Please note again what is inferred about those who do not hold to the doctrine of republication as presented
in TLNF. A failure to teach the republication position “will only leave us necessarily impoverished in our faith” and “We will see in only a thin manner the work of our Savior….”

However, the editors of TLNF seem to imply that the doctrine of republication (complete with a meritorious works principle) is the doctrine upon which justification stands or falls.

Moses and Merit; A Critique of the Klinean Doctrine of Republication — pg. 9, 20
Elam, Van Kooten, Bergquist

Note, what is happening here is that the Klinean Republicationists are trying to read everyone out of the Reformed movement who does not agree with their completely innovative reading of the Mosaic Covenant. It is almost as if they are saying …“Agree with us or you are no friend of the Reformed faith.”

The idea of the nature of the “covenant” has been debated for centuries by many Luminaries in the Reformed faith. Disagreements among Theologians of significance are plentiful. It is obvious that it is an important doctrine. However, for a bunch of neophytes to show up in the late 20th – Early 21st century and tell all of us that it is their way or the highway is laughable in both its hubris and its cheek.