David Bentley Hart restates the view (popular with the Radical Orthodox) which traces the decline of Western Christianity to the nominalism of the medieval period: when God became a kind of pure will. He sees Calvin as the moment when that poisoned stream becomes a flood:
...this state of theological decline was so precipitous and complete that it even became posible for someone as formidably intelligent as Calvin, without any apparent embarassment, to regard the fairly lurid portrait of the omnipotent despot of book III of his Institutes - who not only ordains the destiny of souls, but in fact predestines the first sin, and so brings the whole drama of creation and redemption to pass (including the eternal perdition of the vast majority of humanity) as a display of his own dread sovereignty - as a proper depiction of the Christian God. One ancient Augustinian misreading of Paul's ruminations upon the mystery of election had, at last, eventuated in fatalism... p. 134
This is a very nasty (and inaccurate) reading of Calvin, for whom God is primarily the life-giving and tender Father of his creation, and and loving redeemer of his people. This thought permeates the Institutes, rather than the pure omnipotent will of the scholastics. Again, the mode and style of Calvin's work makes all the difference - something you would think Hart would be hip to.
5 comments:
A confession: I'm nowhere near p.134. Mea culpa. However, I've really enjoyed what I have read.
A Confession: this was evidence of SKIPPING AHEAD via the index...
Ahh, the Google mentality: Search
Re. Calvin and Hart: A more practical than academic point.
Is it even possible to see the position in the tradition of one's work? Might Hart's work also be seen as an opening of the flood gates on a poisoned stream by subsequent generations? How can one but simply respond in good faith to what circumstances one is presented with, and hope, in the balance that it engenders more good than ill?
I'll concede that it's a travesty to reduce Calvin of the Institutes to this; but this thought is still present, yes?
If the answer is "You should read the Institutes again", I'll accept the point; I've been meaning to for a while ...
Um, well, yes! The 'horrible decree' is still there yes: but it is not unconditioned by the Fatherhood of God.
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