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Russell Kirk on Conservatism … Rev. McAtee on Russell Kirk — Part I

“Conservatism is the negation of ideology.”

Russell Kirk

Which of course if consistently followed is itself an ideology.

Ideology is an inescapable category. One can not escape having an ideology and living in terms of that ideology. One may not be self-conscious in their ideology but they will live by one all the same.

Perhaps Kirk was going for the idea here that Conservatism is just a matter concerning the way one leans into life but even here the reason that any of us lean into life the way we do is because of what we believe and what we believe when teased out is our ideology/theology.

I really think Kirk swung and missed on this one.

In keeping with the theme of Russell Kirk I offer a brief peek at his listing of the necessary elements that must be present in order to claim the mantle of “Conservative.” Kirk has 10 offerings. They are all listed in bold. My response is in the italics.

“First, the conservative believes that there exists an enduring moral order. That order is made for man, and man is made for it: human nature is a constant, and moral truths are permanent.”

As long as we insist that the only person who can consistently speak this way is the Biblical Christian I couldn’t agree more. However, I would add that by this definition no one outside of Christ — no one who does not confess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior can possibly be a consistent conservative. This is due to the fact that the existence of this enduring moral order is the God of the Bible’s enduring moral order and as such only those who have been reconciled to God in Christ can consistently advocate for this enduring moral order or live in harmony with this enduring moral order.

A small quibble here would be to note that the enduring moral order is made for God before it is made for man.

Human nature is a constant as long as we concede that the human nature in question if sinful apart from Christ and at the same time sinful and saint once in Christ.

We conclude therefore that only the Biblical Christian can be both consistent and conservative at the same time.

Second, the conservative adheres to custom, convention, and continuity.

Again, we must presuppose Biblical Christianity here and so insert the word “Biblical” as an adjective describing custom, convention, and continuity. The reason we must do so is that the Biblical Christian does not embrace custom, convention, and continuity for the sake of custom, convention, and continuity. Indeed, for the Biblical Christian custom, convention, and continuity are only to be esteemed as they rest upon and are reinforced by Biblical warrant. If custom, convention, and continuity do not have biblical warrant then they must be jettisoned for a new custom, a new convention, and a new continuity.

Custom, convention and continuity must always be measured by God’s authoritative word. To appeal to the idea that “We’ve always done it this way,” would be an end to the idea of “Semper Reformanda.”

We need to balance Kirk’s offering here with an observation by Dr. R. J. Rushdoony on this score;

“The ‘experience, traditions, and customs’ of a people are simply not enough to provide an epistemological basis for social order. Experience, tradition, and custom, must themselves be anchored in Biblical Christianity. If experience, tradition, and custom cannot be anchored in Biblical Christianity then they must be replaced by that which is seen as new but is yet rooted in Scripture.”

In 1988 after 70 years of Soviet rule in the Soviet Union would it have been proper to join with Kirk saying that custom, convention, and continuity are signs of being a conservative in the then existing Soviet regime? I don’t think any right minded person would think that a worthy description of conservatism when custom, convention, and continuity can be leveraged in the name of a long-standing and established wicked custom, convention, and continuity.

Third, conservatives believe in what may be called the principle of prescription.

Kirk’s thought here is that we should prefer the long established wisdom of our forebears as handed down generation by generation over and above our novelty of insight leading to a comparative instant demand for change.

Again, this is true only as in relation to the Biblical Christian as that Biblical Christian has had the blessing of being in a line of Biblical Christians for generations.

However, this principle of prescription would be of little good to an individual whose generations prior were of non-Christians. We know this because of what God’s word teaches in I Peter 1:18;

“knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold,”

It does no good whatsoever for the non-Christian to follow Kirk’s principle of prescription if the principle of prescription means they keep on embracing the futile ways inherited from their forefathers.

Fourth, conservatives are guided by their principle of prudence.

What Kirk is getting at here is that conservatives are careful about sudden and rash social order change. Following Chesterton’s advice Conservatives are slow to tear down fences until they first know why our father’s built the fence to begin with.

Revolutionaries are always in a hurry and their desire is for instant social order change. Revolutionaries thus are not prudent. They desire to cut down the mighty oak of an established social order and plant a new acorn and then see it age instantly overnight. Conservatives are slow and methodical when it comes to social order change trusting that their Christian forebears knew what they were doing.

Prudence, has perhaps never been more important when one realizes that in our epoch those who tout themselves as “conservative” are more often than not merely holding down the right side of the left and are therefore not conservative in the least.

Fifth, conservatives pay attention to the principle of variety.

Here Kirk is inveighing against egalitarianism. Kirk understands that modern notions of egalitarianism and equality destroy variety and genuine diversity. The conservative understands that equality means uniformity and that uniformity is the very definition of Hell’s own social order. This principle of variety is in point of fact a plea for liberty in the sense that God is a God who causes men to differ;

We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. Romans 12:6

It is the great Revolutionary sin to pursue equality and it is the great virtue of the conservative to acknowledge a liberty that allows men to differ according to their abilities, talents, and gifts.

R2K Banter — part III

R2K fanboy writes,

GOOD GREIF! How in the world could one come to such a conclusion that Islam is a threat to Christianity?

Bret responds,

Good Grief! How can anyone who knows anything about Church history not conclude that Islam can be a threat to Christianity in different times and places? Was Islam not a threat to the Northern littoral of Christian Africa before it overthrew Christianity in those places? Was Islam not a threat to the Middle East Christians of the Levant before Islam finally swept over those Christian peoples conquering them? Was Islam not a threat to Vienna before Joseph Sobieski won the day in 1683? So, I say again that Islam is once again a threat to Christianity just as it was in the examples given above.

Quit being dense.

R2K fanboy writes,

God has promised His Kingdom would advance, which means Islam, nor even the gates of hell will prevail against it. God has made no such promise of the United States. Therefore, with the Unites States, or without it, The Kingdom of God will continue to advance. It seems we have those who cannot separate The Kingdom of God, from the United States.

Bret responds,

It seems we have someone who never excelled at reading comprehension skills.

All because Islam will not ultimately prevail against the Kingdom of God does not mean that Islam cannot be a threat to Christianity in a particular time and place. One day Christianity will return to the Northern littoral of Africa and those lands which were once Christian and are now Muslim will once again be Christian once again. However, that does not change that before the sons of Allah rolled across the Northern Littoral of Africa that gates of hell did, for a season, prevailed against the Kingdom of God in those places in the sense that the Kingdom of God was not the ruling motif in those lands and Christ was not owned as Priest and King by majority of the population in those lands.

Having said that, given your lack of intelligence you’ve displayed so far, I sense I need to qualify the above paragraph by also saying that the Kingdom of God was still present among the Redeemed who still lived in those lands under the boot of Islam.

I completely reject your assertion that Christians are not told to take every thought captive to make them obedient to Christ and that II Corinthians 10: has nothing to do with all Christians taking every thought captive to the end of demolishing strongholds.

R2K Banter — Part II

R2K fanboy writes,

Rushdoony seems to be credited with the reconstruction concept which would sort of demonstrate it is something rather new.

Bret responds,

1.) Rushdoony merely brought to light something that is inescapable and gave it a title. All men are reconstructionists in one direction or another. That has been true since the creation of Adam and Eve. After the fall, unredeemed men reconstruct all of life in a luciferian direction and redeemed men reconstruct all of life in a Christ honoring direction. Rushdoony merely recognized this and gave it a name. So the name (Reconstructionism) may be new but the idea that it is attached to is as old as time.

R2K fanboy writes,

I have no interest in reconstructing culture. My interest is in preaching the Gospel, and allowing the Gospel to do it’s work, which will indeed affect the culture. If my interest was the culture, and I were successful in reconstructing the culture according to the Mosaic law, we would have a lot of good moral folks in hell.

Bret responds,

This is not an either or thing. Christians are told to disciple the nations, teaching the nations all that Christ has taught. That means that as we are heralding the Gospel, and baptizing the nations, we are discipling the nations so that they embrace the Mosaic law as the template by which they might have a just civil law order.

It is true that people can think that their outward righteousness to the 2nd use of the law is a sufficient hope for heaven but that is where the careful preaching of law and gospel come in so that people don’t have that false hope of trusting in their civil righteousness in order to be right with God.

R2K fanboy,

Oh? So I am a coward because I am not taking up the same fight as you? Well, how about the fact that I am confronting you, and your ideas? In other words, I am indeed taking up a fight but not with those who are outside, but rather with those who name the Name of Christ.

Bret responds,

I beg your pardon. I should have included the truth that the only way to make a R2K pajama boy fighting mad is by introducing him to a Biblical Christians. The R2K fanboy will fight all day with those who insist on all of Christ for all of life.

R2K fanboy writes,

There is a tremendous difference between attempting to affect culture by enacting the Mosaic law upon the unregenerate, as opposed to preaching the Gospel, and allowing the Gospel to do it’s work.

Moreover, as far as my believing Christianity to be a “private matter” I have spent the last nine years almost daily debating with atheists. So then, I am not under the impression Christianity is a “private matter” but I am also not under the impression I am to force what it is I believe and am convinced of upon others.

Bret responds,

Again … We do not get to choose to either

A.) Preach the Gospel (or)
B.) Reconstructing all of life to the glory of God

Secondly, if you won’t force what it is you believe and are convinced of upon others they will force what they believe and are convinced of upon you and your seed. Take your choice. You are operating with a Classically liberal world and life view and are trying to say that such a wicked template is a Christian norm. It is not.

R2K fanboy writes,

Again, there is a tremendous difference between not being a threat to the US, as opposed to Christianity?

Bret responds,

All false religions are a threat to Christianity and so should not be tolerated.

R2K Banter — part I

R2K fanboy writes,

My understanding is, there is the Church, which is a Holy nation, a royal priesthood, and there are the lost of the world. I also understand enacting the laws of God into the civil laws of the land has no power in the least to save the lost. Rather, it is only the Gospel which has the power to save. In other words, folks must, and have to be regenerated. Even Rushdoony agreed with this. Therefore, attempting to enact the Mosaic law upon the unregenerate has no effect.

Moreover, allow us to recall when there were those in Jerusalem who were insisting the Gentiles adhere to the laws of Moses that Peter stood up and said,

“Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?”

It seems pretty clear here Peter is proclaiming that the law is a yoke of burden that even the Jews were not able to bear, and we are to place this yoke upon the unregenerate?

Bret responds

Well, this eliminates the idea that you might be a Seminary Professor because not even a Seminary Professor would make the category mistake that you have blundered into here.

1.) I do not believe that enacting the Mosaic laws and penalty for laws will redeem the lost. No one who is orthodox believes that. (And I am nothing if not orthodox.)

2.) Instead the argument for enacting the Mosaics (Sodomy is a crimes, Stealing is a crime, Murder is a crime, etc.) is to introduce lawful order. Enacting the 2nd use of the law is to the end of what is called the political use of the law (2nd use of the law.) This political or civil use of the law has as its purpose the restraining of evil. All admit that the law cannot change hearts so that the wicked become good but the law can limit lawlessness by its threats and promise of judgment for violators of the law. When used in this way the 2nd use of the law secures and protects the civil law order and serves to guard the judicially innocent from the wicked. (See Dt. 13:6-11:19;16-21; Rm. 13:3-4)

3.) Peter was saying that in terms of salvation the Gentiles could not bear the yoke of the law as a means by which the unregenerate could secure righteousness. Peter was not talking about the 2nd use of the law.

R2K fanboy writes,

Now, couple this with the fact that Paul asks the question, “what do I have to do with judging those outside”, and we have to wonder where in the world one would get the idea that the Church is to attempt to enact the Mosaic law upon those outside the Church? So then, it seems as a Christian I am free to associate with the immoral folks outside the Church, but am forbidden from associating with the immoral who claims to be a Christian.

Therefore, no matter what you would like to call it, there is definitely two different spheres. The regenerate, and the unregenerate, and enacting the Mosaic law upon the laws of the land will not change this fact.

Bret responds,

I never denied that the antithesis between the righteous and the unrighteous did not exist.

There definitely are two spheres. There is the sphere that is animated by those who belong to their father the Devil and the sphere that is animated by those who have the deposit of the Holy Spirit. However, as those two dwell cheek by jowl in the civil order some civil law has to prevail and the civil law that should prevail is God’s law enacted into the law code of the land.

Secondly, you are not free to have concourse with immoral folks outside the church. Elsewhere God writes, “Do you not know that bad company corrupts good character.” James 4:4 teaches,

know ye not that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

God says in Romans 13, “Hate that which is evil.”

Finally, when Paul talks about not judging those outside the Church he is speaking in the context of judging those inside the Church with judging including the idea of bringing Church discipline. Since those outside the Church cannot have church discipline brought upon them therefore in that sense and in that sense only we are not to judge those outside the church.

Fisking Wolfe on His Appeal to Classical Natural Law Theory to Overturn R2K

What follows beneath the article is a brief running fisk critique of Stephen Wolfe’s offering. Needless to say, I am not impressed at this attempt to resurrect Natural law theory as a replacement for Theonomy.

Stephen Wolfe and the rest of the Natural Law lovers have to learn at some point that the only reason appeal to Natural Law could work once upon a time in the West is because the West already was a largely Christian civilization. The appeal to Natural Law could work in 1500 or 1100 because Europe already had a Christian consensus and so the appeal to a Natural law that supported the already existing Christian consensus could win the day. However, we no longer live in a Western Civilization where there is a Christian consensus therefore appeals to Natural Law are never going to work since a pagan and un-Christian people are never going to agree that Natural Law teaches a Christian law order.

Natural law is a myth in terms of its inability to govern a social order in a Christian direction when the social order is manned by pagans.

Classical Reformed Theonomy

“The natural law is an ordering of reason, consisting of moral principles that are innate in rational creatures, given by God, who is the author of nature.”

Stephen Wolfe

1.) Natural law cannot serve as a mechanism for building social orders because nature, like man’s reason, is fallen.

2.) As the Belgic confession Article 14 teaches Natural law is limited in what it can and cannot accomplish:

“For the commandment of life which he (man) had received,5 he

transgressed; and by sin separated himself from God6 who was his true life, having corrupted his whole nature,7 whereby he made himself liable to corporal and spiritual death.8 And being thus become wicked, perverse, and corrupt in all his ways, he hath lost all his excellent gifts which he had received from God9 and only retained a few remains thereof,10 which, however, are sufficient to leave man without excuse;11 for all the light which is in us is changed into darkness,12 as the Scriptures teach us, saying: The light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth13 it not; where St. John calleth men darkness.”

3.) Moral principles, to be sure, are innate in fallen man, however those who champion Natural Law as a mechanism whereby social orders can be organized do not seem to understand that fallen man suppresses what is innate to him in unrighteousness (see Romans 1).

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“Laws are just only if they command what proceeds from God’s natural law.”

Stephen Wolfe

1.) You mean a law isn’t just if it proceeds from God’s special Revelation?

2.) Where do we find this consensus on what God’s natural law teaches? What library book contains that information?

3.) Does Wolf realize how many versions of Natural law exists? Will it be Natural Law that teaches us which version of Natural law is correct?

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” In this way, the magistrate mediates divine civil rule, as the one who determines appropriate action from natural law principles.”

Stephen Wolfe

I guarantee I never voted for anyone upon the idea that they had the capacity to determine appropriate action from natural law principles.

When will our eggheads ever realize that Natural Law is a thin reed to lean on in times that find us being ruled by anti-Christ pagans? No Mao, or Stalin, or Bite-Me is ever going to change their ruling based on our appeal to Natural law. Better to appeal to God’s revealed law in Scripture so that the refusal of Magistrates to yield to God’s law will be seen for what it is — defiance of the God of the Bible.

______

“A Christian commonwealth is an entity that acts upon civil society via civil law for the people’s earthly and heavenly good.”

Stephen Wolfe

No, rather a Christian commonwealth is an entity that acts upon civil society via civil law for God’s glory — which will then result in people’s earthly and heavenly good.

Wolfe’s definition puts man at the center so is just another form of humanism.

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“Not every particular civil law of a Christian civil government is distinctively Christian. Indeed, most are simply human; they concern human things.”

Stephen Wolfe

But how can we know what “human” is unless we presuppose Christianity? Therefore I must contend that any law that is genuinely human must at the same time be Christian since only Christianity gives us a basis wherein we can define human.

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“Since Scripture contains the natural law (in inscripturated form), Scripture can and ought to inform our understanding of the natural law, the common good, proper determinations for civil law, and the means to heavenly life.”

Stephen Wolfe

If Scripture contains natural law why do we need natural law? Why not just appeal to Scripture?

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“No civil law can be fundamentally derived from a supernatural principle.”

Stephen Wolfe

Now, that one is a mouthful.

If something is in the Bible does that make it a supernatural principle? After all, the whole bible is a supernaturally inspired book. If the Bible tells me that a man shall not lie with a man is it wrong to make a civil law based on that since, per Wolfe, no civil law can be fundamentally derived from a supernatural principle?

______

Although the Mosaic law is of divine origin, the law in itself, in substance, shares the same classification as other examples of civil law—it is one possible body of law that “proceed[s] from the immovable principles and general conclusion” of the natural law. The Mosaic law is not above natural law; it is a perfect application of it.

Stephen Wolfe

But Stephen, other examples of civil law cannot claim to have been given by God for man’s good ordering. As such, the Mosaic Law cannot be set in the same level as all other law orders that deviate from the Mosaic law.

Any changes in civil law orders have to come, not by an appeal to Natural law, but by an appeal to the reality that certain laws in the Mosaic order are not part of the general equity.

Wolfe schematic puts the Mosaic law on the same level as other Christian law orders that deviated from the Mosaic law. It also makes the mistake of lifting Natural Law over God’s revealed law when it comes to how civil law in Christian law orders should be arrived at. Wolfes schematic is inherently humanistic.

________

But (the Mosaic Law) is not thereby a suitable body of law for all nations, for every nation’s circumstances are different; it would not be good for every nation. For this reason, as the Reformed tradition has almost universally affirmed, the Mosaic law, taken as a whole, is not binding on all nations, even Christian nations. Yet because the Mosaic law perfectly follows from the natural law (albeit suited for a certain people), it can serve as a guide or source of law for all nations. The Mosaic law, therefore, remains relevant to all civil polities.

Stephen Wolfe

1.) The Reformed tradition has indeed affirmed that the Mosaic law taken as a whole, is not binding on all other nations — even Christian nations but it affirmed this not by appealing to the kind of Natural law that Wolfe is appealing to but did so by insisting on the reality of general equity. In other words if a civil law order was to negate some aspect of the Mosaic civil code it had to do so by arguing that the general equity did not apply and so some law belonging to the Mosaic should not be enforced by a contemporary civil law order.

2.) In this paragraph above Wolfe lifts Natural law (an unstated amorphous reality) above God’s special revelation so that special revelation has to serve Natural law. In such a situation is God really God?

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The “ancient” division (as Calvin called it) of the Mosaic Law divides it into moral, ceremonial, and civil (or political) law. The moral law refers to “nothing else than the testimony of natural law, and of that conscience which God has engraven on the minds of men.”

Stephen Wolfe

1.) The problem here though is that the civil law was the incarnation of the Moral law as applied to specific instances. The civil law was the instantiation of the Moral law as teased out with specificity.

2.) There is nothing in Scripture that requires me to read the Moral law as being merely the testimony of natural law. If God had wanted to say that He could have easily said just that. Wolfe is adding a layer to God’s Word regarding the character and nature of the Moral law.

3.) Even the three-fold distinction (which I embrace) is not per Scriptural Revelation. It likewise is forced upon the Scripture. The law can just as easily be argued to be one law without these subdivisions. We know that the ceremonial law has since been altered because the Scripture comments so. However, the Scripture if anything reinforces the ongoing validity of God’s moral/civil law.

Conclusion

Stephen Wolfe tries to cloak is standard Natural Law theory in theonomic jargon in order to peel off weak theonomists from theonomy. Wolfe calls his Natural Law theory, “classical Reformed theonomy.”

Classical Reformed theonomy my arse. Wolfe offers this up as a half-way house between R2K theorizing and Bahnsenian Theonomy. It is a half way house no theonomist worth his salt is ever going to consider taking up residence.

Certainly Wolfe’s arrangement is far superior to R2K (which he is fighting against) but at the end of the day it remains laced with the same kind of subjectivity wherein R2k is laced.