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Rewriting Calvin: Schleiermacher on the atonement and priestly office of Christ

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 May 2022

Joshua Ralston
Joshua Ralston*
Affiliation:
School of Divinity, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
*
Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

The burden of this essay is to show that Friedrich Schleiermacher's theology of the atonement and account of Christ's soteriological work as priest is marked by recognisably Reformed commitments and logics that both build from and critique John Calvin and later Reformed scholastics. The essay contends that it is when Schleiermacher departs strongly from orthodox conclusions regarding substitutionary atonement that he mostly clearly appeals to key aspects of Reformed theology. Put differently, when Schleiermacher critiques the material content of Reformed orthodoxy, he does so by drawing on other doctrinal claims that are fundamental in Reformed thought: the divine decree, union with Christ, the import of sanctification and the interconnection between dogmatic expression and Christian piety. Schleiermacher presents creative solutions to theological conundrums, particularly those that plague Calvin and the later Reformed tradition about the relationship between God's eternal decree of grace and the appeasement of divine wrath on the cross.

Keywords

atonementJohn CalvinReformed theologyFriedrich Schleiermacher
Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 75 , Issue 2 , May 2022 , pp. 89 - 103
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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References

1 Schleiermacher, Friedrich, The Christian Faith, ed. Mackintosh, H. R. and Stewart, J. S., trans. Ballie, D. M. et al. (London: T&T Clark, 1999), §104, p. 451Google Scholar. All citations will be taken from the Ballie translations with corresponding references to the section number (§° in the original German from Friedrich Schleiermacher, Der Christliche Glaube (1830/31), (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2008). German text or terminology will be noted in parentheses, with citations given to the English translation's pagination.

2 CF, §100.1, p. 425.

3 CF, §101, p. 431.

4 Gerrish, B. A., The Old Protestantism and the New: Essays on the Reformation Heritage (London: T&T Clark, 2004), p. 194Google Scholar.

5 While there continues to be important scholarship on Schleiermacher in German, the focus has been primarily on his methodological, philosophical and hermeneutical contributions and less on his dogmatic claims. There are exceptions to this generalisation in the work of Dietrich Korsch, who sees Schleiermacher as a theologian of redemption.

6 van den Belt, Henk, ‘Friedrich Schleiermacher on the Reformed Orthodox Doctrine of Predestination’, in van der Pol, Frank (ed.), The Doctrine of Election in Reformed Perspective: Historical and Theological Investigations of the Synod of Dort 1618–1619 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2019), p. 218Google Scholar.

7 Pederson, Daniel, ‘Schleiermacher and the Reformed Scholastics on the Divine Attributes’, International Journal of Systematic Theology 17/4 (2015), pp. 413–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8 Schleiermacher, Friedrich, The Life of Schleiermacher: As Unfolded in His Autobiography and Letters, 2 vols., trans. Rowan, Frederica (London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1860), vol. 1, p. 46Google Scholar.

9 Aulén, Gustav, Christus Victor: An Historical Study of the Three Main Types of the Idea of the Atonement (London: SPCK Publishing, 2010), p. 136Google Scholar.

10 Ibid., p. 137.

11 Gunton, Colin, The Acuality of the Atonement: A Study of Metaphor, Rationality and the Christian Tradition (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1988), p. 14CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

12 Calvin, John, The Institutes of Christian Religion, trans. Allen, John (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster Press, 1949), p. 504Google Scholar.

13 Ibid., p. 501.

14 Ibid.

15 Ibid., p. 532.

16 Ibid., p. 502.

17 Ibid., p. 506.

18 Ibid., pp. 506–7.

19 Ibid., p. 529.

20 Ibid., p. 530. Note how for Calvin God is reconciled to us and not only us to God.

21 DeVries, Dawn, Jesus Christ in the Preaching of Calvin and Schleiermacher (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2002), p. 98Google Scholar.

22 Calvin, Institutes, p. 504.

23 Here the use of convenire diverges from both Thomas’ use in describing the fittingness of the incarnation and crucifixion as well as from later scholastic Protestants who discuss whether or not the cross is fitting or necessary. Rather than discuss the fittingness of the atonement in relation to God, as is the focus in these debates, Calvin deploys convenire to depict how God's communication was a fitting and appropriate way to communicate with finite and fallen creatures. The term functions more in relation to Calvin's understanding of divine accommodation than in relation to the atonement.

24 Calvin, Institutes, p. 532.

25 Ibid., p. 529.

26 Helm, Paul, John Calvin's Ideas (Oxford: OUP, 2004), pp. 336–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

27 Turretin, Francis, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, vol. 2, trans. Giger, George Musgrave (Phillisburgh, PA: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1994), p. 419Google Scholar.

28 John Owen, A Dissertation on Divine Justice: Or, the Claims of Vindicatory Justice Asserted (Madrid: HardPress Publishing, 2019 [1653]).

29 CF, §101.3, p. 435.

30 CF, §11, p. 52.

31 CF, §101, p. 431.

32 CF, §100.3, p. 430.

33 CF, §100.3, p. 431.

34 CF, §100.3, p. 430.

35 CF, §102.1, p. 438.

36 It must be noted that Schleiermacher's own account of the old kingdom and of the Old Testament is marked by strongly supersessionist logics that tend to cut off the church from Israel.

37 Evan Kuehn, ‘Godforsakenness as the End of Prophecy: A Proposal from Schleiermacher's Glaubenslehre’, Harvard Theological Review 107/3 (2014), p. 291.

38 CF, §103.1, p. 441

39 CF, §104.1, p. 451.

40 CF, §104.1, p. 452.

41 CF, §104.3, p. 455.

42 CF, §100.2, p. 427.

43 CF, §104.2, p. 453.

44 CF, §104.4, p. 462.

45 Ibid.

46 CF, §104.4, p. 463.

47 CF, §101.4, p. 437.

48 CF, §101.4, 436.

49 CF, §104.3, 456.

50 CF, §104.4, p. 461.

51 CF, §109.3, p. 501.

52 Friedrich Schleiermacher, On the Doctrine of Election, trans. Iain G. Nicol and Allen G. Jorgenson (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2012), p. 53.

53 Ibid., p. 76.

54 CF, §101.1, p. 431.

55 CF, §104.3, p. 456.

56 CF, §104.3, pp. 456–7.

57 CF, §104.4, p. 460.

58 Katherine Sonderegger, ‘The Doctrine of Vicarious Atonement in Schleiermacher and Baeck’, Zeitschrift für Neuere Theologiegeschichte 2/2 (1995), p. 183.

59 CF, §166, p. 727.

60 Mary J. Steufert, ‘Reclaiming Schleiermacher for Twenty-First Century Atonement Theory: The Human and the Divine in Feminist Christology’, Feminist Theology 15/1 (2006), pp. 98–120.

61 Calvin, Institutes, p. 505.