J. Gresham Machen and the Boundaries of Theological Liberalism
by Terry A. Chrisope Vol. XV, No. 5, May 2002
Missouri Baptist College
[Introduction: We Southern Baptists have been fighting a theological battle for the authority of Scripture since at least 1979, and this struggle has been so important, so intense, and so time-consuming that we tend to look only inward – inward organizationally and temporally. Thus we often make the mistaken, unspoken assumption that this spiritual warfare is unique to our time and our denomination. But that is not so.
Though the conflict surges or ebbs, and sometimes one denomination is engulfed, sometimes another, the contest for and against God’s authority and the purity of His Word has been continuous literally since the serpent said in the Garden of Eden, “Yea, hath God said ...”
The following article informs us of J. Gresham Machen’s struggle among American Presbyterians in the 1920s and ‘30s. Note the parallels with SBC events in the 1970s, ‘80s, and ‘90s. I have added bold print for emphasis. T. C. Pinckney, editor]
On the last Sunday morning of 1923, J. Gresham Machen spoke the following words from the pulpit of First Presbyterian Church of Princeton, New Jersey:
“The plain fact is, disguised though it be by the use of traditional language, that two mutually exclusive religions are contending for the control of the church today. One is the great redemptive religion known as Christianity; the other is the naturalistic or agnostic Modernism . . . which is opposed, not at one point, but at every point, to the Christian faith. A separation between the two is the crying need of the hour; that separation alone can bring Christian unity.”
Machen was arguing that theological and ecclesiastical boundaries needed to be recognized and applied in the professing Christian church bodies. Ironically, a decade later Machen was learning something about the meaning of ecclesiastical boundaries. In the 1930s, however, Machen was not responsible for setting the boundaries. Rather, he was the target of those in the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. who wanted to remove an irritant from their ranks, namely Machen himself. The boundaries in this case were not defined doctrinally but bureaucratically: Machen had transgressed the limits of toleration by founding and supporting an independent mission board devoted to the spread of the biblical gospel. This turn of events was ironic because it was Machen who in the previous decade had advocated the observance of boundaries within Christianity, and it was now against him that they were applied.
J. Gresham Machen was born in 1881 of Southern Presbyterian ancestry and grew up in Baltimore, attending Johns Hopkins University to study classics. He was a student at Princeton Theological Seminary from 1902 to 1905, and upon graduation went to Germany to attend the universities of Marburg and Gottingen for the 1905-06 academic year. He returned to Princeton to teach Greek in the fall of 1906. Several years later he sought ordination in the Northern Presbyterian Church, subsequent to which he was installed in the regular faculty of Princeton Seminary in 1915. During the 1920s he sounded a warning against theological liberalism in the church and supported an unsuccessful effort by theological conservatives to regain control of the Northern Presbyterian Church. Upon the reorganization of Princeton Seminary in 1929, Machen led in the establishment of Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. He later formed an independent mission board for which he was defrocked by the northern Presbyterian body, and subsequently founded in 1936 what came to be known as the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. He died on January 1, 1937, in North Dakota, while seeking to advance the interests of his fledgling denomination.
It is the thesis of this paper that J. Gresham Machen maintained that there must be well-defined boundaries of evangelical Christianity in order for it to maintain its identity and its fidelity to its mission. In particular, Machen held that these boundaries must be defined theologically, acknowledged honestly, and applied ecclesiastically.
Boundaries Must Be Defined Theologically
When J. Gresham Machen set out to define historic Christianity and its modern rival, religious liberalism, and to describe the difference between them, he determined to do so theologically. His single most substantial contribution to such an effort was his 1923 volume, Christianity and Liberalism [available today in paperback; published by Eerdmans], in which he sought “to present the issue as sharply and clearly as possible.” After his introductory chapter setting forth the purpose and limitations of the study, Machen moved to a second chapter entitled “Doctrine.” In this chapter he affirmed the importance of doctrine against its detractors, observing that even religious liberalism had its own doctrines, which were quite tenaciously held by its adherents. Machen organized the next five chapters of the book around several broad theological loci: God and man, the Bible, Christ, salvation, and the church. With respect to Machen’s treatment of his subject, several observations may be made.
First, as Machen sought to define historic Christianity over against religious liberalism, it is evident that he was describing evangelical Christianity. This is apparent from at least two considerations. In the first place, Machen at times explicitly referred to evangelicalism. For example, when he argued that all points of doctrine are not equally important, he mentioned several instances by way of illustration, including the difference between Roman Catholicism and “evangelical Protestantism in all its forms” (C&L, 52). Later in the book, Machen consistently used the term “evangelical” to describe that Christianity with which he was contrasting religious liberalism. For instance, he argued that “as a matter of fact many (indeed in spirit really all) evangelical churches are creedal churches” (C&L, 162). From this point on to the end of the chapter (and the book), Machen used the term “evangelical” on almost every page, often more than once (C&L, 164-79). It is clear that it was evangelical Christianity that he had in view throughout his argument. In the second place, Machen’s argument throughout the book was centered on the gospel, the “evangel.” He consistently defined the Christian message as the proclamation of certain historical events involving Jesus of Nazareth along with an explanation of their significance. “From the beginning, the Christian gospel, as indeed the name ‘gospel’ or ‘good news’ implies, consisted in an account of something that had happened” (C&L, 27). Machen’s orientation was focused explicitly on the Christian evangel or gospel, which by definition is an evangelical stance. This consideration, combined with Machen’s use of the specific terminology “evangelical,” serves to indicate that Machen was setting out to define and defend nothing other than evangelical Christianity.
Second, as Machen sought to define evangelical Christianity over against its modern counterpart, religious liberalism, he did so by defining it theologically. This is evident from the very structure of his book: Chapter II defends a doctrinal approach to the question of the difference between the two, and the remainder of the chapters treat several of the traditional loci of Christian theology. Machen regarded liberal claims of lack of concern for doctrine as often disingenuous. “In many forms of liberalism,” he said, the crucial matter is not a lack of concern for doctrine as such but a rejection of “one particular doctrine in the interests of another.” In truth, “there are doctrines of modern liberalism, just as tenaciously and intolerantly upheld as any doctrines that find a place in the historic creeds” (C&L, 18). At bottom, religious liberalism is often as theological as evangelical Christianity is; it simply adheres to a different theology.
Third, Machen compared the theology of evangelical Christianity with that of religious liberalism, and on the basis of that comparison declared that liberalism falls outside the bounds of historic Christianity. Machen described religious liberalism in both general terms and specific terms. In general terms, he described liberalism as follows: “manifold as are the forms in which the movement appears, the root of the movement is one; the many varieties of modern liberal religion are rooted in naturalism – that is, in the denial of any entrance of the creative power of God (as distinguished from the ordinary course of nature) in connection with the origin of Christianity” (C&L, 2). If this analysis is correct, then it is the case that liberalism denied the very thing which historic Christianity affirmed: the entrance of the gracious and redemptive power of God into human history in the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth.
Then, in specific terms, with respect to the six theological loci of God, man, the Bible, Christ, salvation, and the church, he claimed that religious liberalism showed itself to have departed from the historic Christian position. Concerning God, Machen held that Christianity adheres to a rational theism, acknowledging God both as transcendent and as the spiritual Father of those humans who are in Christ by faith. Liberalism, in contrast, adheres to a purely immanent deity (often applying the name “God” to the world process, thus manifesting a strong pantheizing tendency), whom it acknowledges as the Father of all humans without distinction. The Incarnation is often just a symbol of this oneness of humanity with God. Man, in the Christian view, is considered a sinner who is under the just condemnation of God. The Liberal view of man, however, is characterized by a loss of the consciousness of sin and by a confidence in human goodness (a view which approaches paganism in its conception of man). Christianity views the Bible as an account of revelation from God to man, and as therefore unique. In particular, the Bible contains a historical narration of redemptive events with an explanation of their significance. The book itself is inspired by God and authoritative for Christian belief and practice. For Liberalism, the Bible is merely an expression of Christian experience. The Liberal view denies or misrepresents the historic doctrine of inspiration and in reality rejects the authority of Christ, substituting for it a vague Christian consciousness. Concerning Jesus Christ, the central figure of the Christian faith, Machen argued that historic Christianity regarded Christ as properly the object of faith, for he is the divinely-appointed means of getting rid of sin through trusting in him. Jesus possessed a unique messianic consciousness while at the same time manifesting no consciousness of sin. He was (and is) a supernatural person, uniting in himself full deity (that of the God of the Bible) and full humanity in a single person. Liberalism, on the other hand, saw Christ as only the example of faith, with Christianity being the emulation of Jesus’ religious life. In his person, Jesus represented the highest level of humanity but nothing more. Any supposed acknowledgment of Jesus’ divinity by liberals was, Machen claimed, either a distortion of terms or outright dishonesty. Salvation, according to Christianity, is based on something Jesus did, namely his atoning death. The work of Christ is applied to the individual by the Holy Spirit. Justification, the centerpiece of salvation, is received by humans as a gift through faith. For religious liberalism, the basis of salvation is found in the effects of Jesus’ death upon man (not upon God): thus, Jesus is an example of self-sacrifice, or a manifestation of how much God hates sin, or a display of the love of God. Furthermore, liberalism opposes the concept of any supernatural operations in the experience of the individual. In the liberal conception, the world’s evil is to be overcome by the world’s good. Salvation is attained by “making Christ master,” that is, by one’s own obedience, and the church’s program becomes one of attempting to improve the conditions of this world only. For Christianity, the church is the brotherhood of those who are redeemed in Christ and an institution for the propagation of a message, the Christian gospel. The transformation of society at large begins with the transformation effected in the society of the redeemed. The modern church is troubled by large numbers of non-Christians who have been admitted to its membership. [Note: We Southern Baptists count over 16 million members, but only a bit more than 5 million are in church on Sunday! TCP] In the liberal view, all men are already brothers, and by implication the church is an institution for the transforming of society at large in this world. The church is troubled by those who emphasize doctrine.
Given this set of antitheses, Machen believed that the only possible conclusion is that historic Christianity and religious liberalism are two entirely different religions. This emphasis is found repeatedly in the argument of Christianity and Liberalism.
Boundaries Must Be Acknowledged Honestly
The second major claim made here is that Machen argued that the differences between evangelical Christianity and religious liberalism should be honestly acknowledged. Machen himself had undergone a long and anguished intellectual struggle concerning the supernatural origin and historical truthfulness of biblical Christianity. He refused to seek ordination in the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. and appointment to full faculty rank at Princeton Theological Seminary until he had resolved his intellectual questions in favor of historic Christianity. He was motivated in this by his own intellectual integrity and by the conviction that one who occupies the teaching office in the church ought to be convinced of the truthfulness of that belief system which he purportedly and officially represents.
Having applied the highest standards of intellectual integrity to himself, Machen was bound by conviction to apply the same standards of honesty to others. He did not shy away from doing so. He maintained his position in three respects. First, regarding the effort of religious liberals to minimize the whole question of doctrinal differences and to unite the church around the activities of Christian service, he said simply, “it is dishonest” (C&L, 162). There are stark differences and they will not disappear by denying or ignoring them.
Second, on the basis of his conclusion that religious liberalism is not Christianity and the fact that evangelical churches are implicitly creedal, Machen argued that it is dishonest for adherents of liberalism to seek positions of authority and responsibility in the professedly evangelical churches. For example, he wrote, “many (indeed in spirit really all) evangelical churches are creedal churches. . . if a man does not accept their creed he has no right to a place in their teaching ministry” (C&L, 162). Later in the same chapter, Machen made the following pointed statement:
Whether we like it or not, these Churches are founded upon a creed; they are organized for the propagation of a message. If a man desires to combat that message instead of propagating it, he has no right, no matter how false the message may be, to gain a vantage ground for combating it by making a declaration of his faith which-be it plainly spoken-is not true. (C&L, 164).
Third, Machen argued that religious liberalism is dishonest in its use of traditional Christian terminology while imbuing the words with a different meaning. He claimed, “In order to maintain themselves in the evangelical churches and quiet the fears of their conservative colleagues, the liberals resort constantly to a double use of language,” as when they confess belief that Jesus is God, but do not mean by those terms what historic Christianity has meant. He went on to argue that “language is truthful . . . when the meaning intended to be produced in the mind of the particular person addressed, is in accordance with the facts” (C&L, 111-12).
Having exposed the subterfuges of religious liberalism and affirmed the simple sanctity of honest language and the need for intellectual integrity, Machen’s position stood as a clear call for a straightforward recognition of the real differences between the two theological camps.
Boundaries Must Be Applied Ecclesiastically
The third major assertion made here is that Machen held that the boundaries of evangelicalism must be applied ecclesiastically. Machen maintained that the evangelical church bodies were implicitly confessional; that religious liberalism falls outside the confessional boundaries of evangelical Christianity to such an extent that it must be considered a different religion; and that therefore there should be an ecclesiastical separation between the two. The latter conclusion is implied in some of Machen’s argumentation relating to the previous point. But Machen did not leave the matter for others to infer. He argued his point explicitly: “a separation between the two parties in the Church is the crying need of the hour” (C&L, 160). In making his case, Machen offered the following matters for consideration.
First, he argued that it is the liberals who should withdraw from the evangelical churches. The advocate of “liberal Christianity” (his quotation marks), “finding the existing ‘evangelical’ churches to be bound up to a creed which he does not accept . . . may either unite himself with some other existing body or else found a new body to suit himself” (C&L, 164-65). Again: “the best way would undoubtedly be the voluntary withdrawal of the liberal ministers from those confessional churches whose confessions they do not, in the plain historical sense, accept” (C&L, 167). Such a move might be difficult for the liberals to make, for several reasons-“abandonment of church buildings,” “the break in family traditions, the injury to sentiment,” not to speak of the loss of resources and loss of opportunity to control the evangelical bodies so as to change their basic nature. But, he said, this course of action has “one supreme advantage which far overbalances all such disadvantages. It is the advantage of honesty” (C&L, 165). Machen pointed out,
There would at least be no more need of using equivocal language, no more need of
avoiding offense. The liberal preacher would obtain the full personal respect even of
his opponents, and the whole discussion would be placed on higher ground. All
would be perfectly straightforward and above-board. (C&L, 165)
Also, such a course of action by the liberals would honor the trust reposed in the evangelical churches by their founders and earlier supporters. These institutions were founded for the purpose of propagating a particular message, the Christian gospel. Those who disagree with that purpose have no right to divert the resources into the goal of combating that message. (C&L, 166)
To suggest that the liberals follow this course of action is not intolerant, Machen argued, for no one is compelled to belong to a Christian church. In American society, the church is a voluntary organization, open to those who agree with its stated beliefs and purposes. Those who disagree are not compelled to join and in plain honesty should remove themselves if they should ever find themselves associated with a body with whose doctrinal stance they do not agree. (C&L, 167-70)
In the course of developing his argument, Machen acknowledged that not all liberals hold to all parts of the system of religious liberalism. But he maintained that “the logical implications of any way of thinking are sooner or later certain to be worked out” (C&L, 172-73). Also, he made it clear that the strictures he brought to bear were brought against those liberals who hold or who seek office in the church, not against those persons who are merely troubled by doubts. With such doubters he possessed the greatest sympathy, having been plagued by doubts and questions himself earlier in his life. His concern was with those liberals who sought a place in the ministry of the church, “not to learn but to teach.” They are “men who are proud in the possession of the knowledge of this world, and seek a place in the ministry that they may teach what is directly contrary to the Confession of Faith to which they subscribe” (C&L, 163-64). Such a circumstance ought not to exist, and simple integrity should compel the liberals to withdraw.
But, second, if the liberals refuse to withdraw, then the adherents of historic Christianity may need to be prepared to do so. Machen did not shrink from considering this possibility.
If the liberal party really obtains full control of the councils of the Church, then no
evangelical Christian can continue to support the Church’s work. If a man believes
that salvation from sin comes only through the atoning death of Jesus, then he cannot
honestly support by his gifts and by his presence a propaganda which is intended to
produce an exactly opposite impression. To do so would mean the most terrible
blood guiltiness which it is possible to conceive. If the liberal party, therefore, really
obtains control of the Church, evangelical Christians must be prepared to withdraw no matter what it costs. (C&L, 166).
Elsewhere he said, “It may be that paganism will finally control [the Presbyterian Church], and that Christian men and women may have to withdraw from a church that has lost it distinctness from the world.” Such a course of action, however, Machen did not consider to be either desirable or necessary in 1923 when he wrote Christianity and Liberalism. It was not desirable because the churches hold a trust, including trust funds, designated for the purpose of propagating the gospel, a purpose which the conservatives were committed to uphold, and thus should not abandon the trust. And withdrawal was not yet necessary, because “the conservatives are in agreement with the plain constitution of the churches, while the liberal party can maintain itself only by an equivocal subscription to declarations which it does not really believe” (C&L, 167). Because the confessional standards of the church were still those with which the conservatives were in harmony, it was not incumbent on them to leave.
Observations
It would appear that there are several applications of Machen’s position to the current situation of evangelical Christianity.
First, it seems clear that the problem has not gone away since Machen’s era. If Christianity has an intellectual content, then that content makes affirmations about God and his relations to the world, affirmations which collectively could be called theology.
Any deviations from this intellectual content of historic Christianity would therefore constitute theological aberrations and must of necessity be theologically defined. Such tendencies toward theological aberration are always present in every age and in every culture and always constitute a threat to the purity and continuance of the biblical faith. Indeed, because of the bent toward error as a consequence of the Fall and the resulting darkening of the mind, and because of the incompleteness of human renewal by God’s grace during this age, the threat of dilution of biblical teaching is ever present within even evangelical Christianity, which professes to be explicitly biblical in its content. Thus there is always the need to define the boundaries which separate biblical Christianity from both the thought forms of the surrounding culture and from the aberrant forms of Christianity which threaten to overwhelm the biblical faith. And therefore Machen’s point that Christianity must be defined theologically and that it must be distinguished theologically from error seems to be well taken. A vital Christianity must be more than a theological system, but it certainly can be no less.
Machen in fact maintained that it is the full biblical teaching that is easiest to defend, as opposed to a truncated system of a few points. For him this meant the defense of the Reformed faith, or Calvinism, which in the Warfieldian tradition was considered the epitome and zenith of biblical religion. In the Evangelical Theological Society the lines cannot be drawn so narrowly, but the ETS has found it necessary in recent years to expand the scope of its doctrinal foundation. Perhaps Machen had a valid point. To continue in this pattern would constitute a movement in the opposite direction from the tendency of fundamentalism (strictly defined) and toward a fuller expression of theological boundaries.
Second, it seems that at the center of the issue of boundaries is the question of what it means to be a Christian. Evangelical Christianity stands over against other traditions by emphasizing, on the basis of biblical teaching, the necessity of regeneration by the Holy Spirit and of the personal exercise of repentance toward God and faith in Jesus Christ in order for a person to be a Christian in the New Testament sense. In this it is distinguished from autosoterism, sacerdotalism, and sacramentalism by its insistence on an immediate and supernaturally-induced experience of divine grace. Evangelicalism is thus at its heart opposed to any mere formalism which admits one into the Christian fellowship on the basis of outward characteristics or external requirements.
This is a matter to which Machen drew attention by his claim that the most serious problem facing Christianity is that large numbers of unbelievers had gained admittance to the churches. He raised the issue again in a 1925 address in which he said, “If the sharp distinction is ever broken down between the church and the world, then the power of the church is gone.” Later in the same address he observed that in contemporary society, church membership often means little more than does membership in the Rotary Club, and that both are viewed in some quarters as merely service organizations. The issue of the definition of a Christian has more recently been raised by Iain H. Murray in his book, Evangelicalism Divided. It is a matter that seems to merit serious attention. As Machen suggested in the above-mentioned article, it is imperative for evangelicals to “face the facts,” just as he called for honesty in grappling with the issue in his own day.
Third, the question of the ecclesiastical application of the boundaries of evangelicalism is still relevant. Recent events in the Southern Baptist Convention and its associated state conventions have shown that theological boundaries are necessary to maintain the purity of evangelical bodies. Sometimes it is the liberals who find it necessary to depart, sometimes it is the conservatives who feel compelled to leave an organization that has left its historic roots. In both cases, the heirs of the evangelical tradition are moved to action on the basis of theological convictions and boundaries. This is a course of action that seems to be demanded by fidelity to the biblical faith. At bottom, as Machen maintained, it is not single doctrines that are at stake, but the nature of Christianity itself.
However, it would seem that the application of discipline and the enforcing of boundaries by evangelicals must be carried out on a theological basis. It would be manifestly unbiblical to act on the grounds of mere bureaucratic expediency, as was the case in the discipline applied against Machen.
Fifth, and finally, it needs to be pointed out that Machen was right. He was correct in claiming that the survival of historic Christianity and the health of the church are dependent on a confidence in the historical truthfulness of the Bible. Those institutions and denominations which turned away from such confidence have lost their Christian identity or are in the process of doing so. Machen’s judgment with regard to religious liberalism has been vindicated by historical developments since the early twentieth century. Hope for the future is to be found in historic Christianity with its theology of divine redemptive grace and its trustworthy and authoritative Bible.