LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. U^Z ffljpqt*.--.— . §0pijrig$ 3f $♦ Shelf i.w.3. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. THE DEVELOPMENT OF Modern Religious Thought ESPECIALLY IN GERMANY EDWIN STUTELY CARR, A.M., D.B. OCT 19 iB95j^7 /e <%QSTON AND^CJHICAGO Congregational SttnUag-Scfjoal ano ^ubltsfjtng £orictg \^^^ \ •G 3 copyright, 1895, By Congregational Sunday-School and Publishing Society. TO MY FATHER WHOSE ASSISTANCE AND ENCOURAGEMENT MADE POSSIBLE MY YEARS OF POST-GRADUATE STUDY CONTENTS, FIBST PEBIOD. CHAPTER I. THE RISE OF CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY. PAGE Christianity originally a moral system 1 Impulse to theology 2 Aristides the Philosopher 2 Justin Martyr 3 Alexandria, birthplace of theology 3 Origen's system a philosophy . . 4 Clement . . 5 Gregory Thaumaturgus 6 CHAPTER II. ORIGEN. Criteria of Truth 8 Doctrine of God 9 Son as Word or Wisdom 10 Soul's fall as in Phaedrus 12 All to be restored 14 The Incarnation a fascinating problem 16 Freedom of Will 17 Importance and Value of Origen's System 23 CHAPTER III. AUGUSTINE. Facts of his life 25 Teachings lacking in unity and consistency 29 ii Contents. PAGE Criteria of Christian Truth 31 Doctrine of God 34 Doctrines of sin and grace 37 Pelagius and his doctrine 37 Fall in Adam 39 Condition of infants 40 Freedom of will 42 Letters to monks of Adrumetum 45 Predestination 48 Perseverance ; did Adam possess it ? 50 Evil necessary in universe 51 Christ and the Holy Spirit 52 Doctrinal extremes due to philosophical spirit ... 54 Religious feeling made Augustinianism possible ... 55 Augustine and Schleiermacher at one in essence ... 56 Great system-; monistic 56 Augustine and Aristotle 57 CHAPTER IV. THE RENAISSANCE. Rome under Pope Leo X 59 Reforms of Augustine and Luther 60 Ascetic ideal of middle ages 60 Republics of Northern Italy 63 Enthusiasm for classical learning 60 Development of art 67 Italian politics 68 Brutalized rather than humanized 70 Savonarola 71 CHAPTER V. THE REFORMATION. Reformation moral rather than doctrinal 75 No new type of theology 81 CHAPTER VI. THE THEOLOGY OP THE REFORMERS. German Theology 83 Contents. iii PAGE Martin Luther 83 Augsburg Confession 87 The Eucharist 90 Luther and Erasmus on the will ........ 92 Union of Church and State 96 Zwingli 99 Calvin 100 CHAPTER VII. POST-REFORMATION MOVEMENTS. Opposition to predestination 103 Formula of Concord 103 Inspiration of Scriptures 105 Arminian controversy 107 Methodism not consistently Pelagian 112 Protestant scholastic period 113 SECOND PERIOD. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION TO SECOND PERIOD. Historical introduction 117 Scientific introduction 120 Philosophical introduction 125 Parallel of Greek philosophy 134 State of religion in Germany 136 Deism, Materialism, Rationalism 140 CHAPTER II. LEIBNITZ AND WOLFF. Wolff and the Pietists 142 Leibnitz 144 Wolff 149 Orthodox Wolffians . . . . = 155 iv Contents. CHAPTER III. THE AUFKLARUNG. PAGE Mendelssohn 159 Reimarus 161 Lessing 166 CHAPTER IV. THE FAITH PHILOSOPHY AND THE ROMANTIC SCHOOL. Hamann 171 Jacobi 372 Goethe and the Romantic School 174 CHAPTER V. Kant 177 CHAPTER VI. Hegel 190 CHAPTER VII. THE RATIONALISTS. Semler 211 Rohr 213 Paulus . 213 CHAPTER VIII. Schleiermacher 215 CHAPTER IX. THE HEGELIAN SCHOOL. Baur 234 Strauss 235 Biedermann 211 Green's Hegelianism 241 Feuerbach 246 O. Pfleiderer 246 Contents. v CHAPTER X. THE NEW ORTHODOXY AND THE NEW LUTHERANISM. PAGE Harms 249 Hengstenberg 251 Stahl 252 CHAPTER XI. Neander and Weiss 254 CHAPTER XH. THE MEDIATING SCHOOL. Dorner 260 Rothe 263 CHAPTER XIII. The Ritschlian School 265 CHAPTER XIV. Conclusion 270 INTRODUCTION. This little work is the outgrowth of graduate studies originally undertaken for my own intel- lectual satisfaction, and with no definite plan of adding to the immense theological literature of our time. The impulse to this line of reading was received from the lectures of Professor George P. Fisher of Yale, on the History of Doctrine — the most interesting and stimulating course of my seminary years. A fourth year at Yale, and a year in Heidelberg and Berlin, with subsequent reading, furnished the materials for the most part and developed the general theory of the work. An appointment as Williams Fellow in Harvard Divinity School, giving access to the Harvard libraries and to the many advantages of lectures and personal advice from instructors, made it pos- sible to bring my conclusions to final literary expression. My general problem in the work is to explain historically the origin of the prevalent skepticism which denies the miracles and the supernatural claims of Christianity, ridicules its " other-worldly " vii viii Modern Religious Thought. character, and would establish a kingdom of happiness for men on earth instead of in heaven. This tendency to emphasize the worth and dig- nity of man and to question the need and the validity of a divine revelation I have character- ized as the Greek spirit. It is the worldly wisdom which Paul condemns, and it is at enmity with the spirit of Christianity, whether it appears in Origen or Pelagius, Kant, Hegel, or Schleiermacher. It is the source of the scientific assumption of the uniformity of natural law, which, as I endeavor to show especially in Strauss, begs the question as to the miraculous contents of the Scriptures. I choose the field of German religious thought to illustrate these truths, because the development of the principles is there clearly marked and easily followed ; and German thought is now the leading influence in the theological world. It will be seen that my plan in the work is to contrast the opposing Greek and Christian ten- dencies in the three forms they have assumed in Christian history : (1) With Origen and Augus- tine ; (2) in Calvinism (or Lutheranism) as opposed to Arminianism; (3) in the so-called liberal and conservative schools of this century. In the Renaissance period this contrast is very striking, Introduction. ix for it appears unmistakably as the struggle of the Greek spirit with the Christian. This being my plan, it seems to me advantageous and even economical of space to give a thorough discussion of Origen and Augustine, with whom the opposing tendencies appear in their early and most characteristic form. This plan is most ad- vantageous because, in discussing the first (Augus- tinian) period of German theology, I can dismiss the different theologians with a brief statement, suggesting merely the individual variations from the Augustinian type. And the same holds true largely of the second period in relation to Origen. As the first period of German thought is Augus- tinian, so the second may be said to be Greek (Origenistic}. The development of liberal thought culminates in Hegel ; and Hegel's Christianity, as Kaftan well says, is simply Origen's Logos doc- trine stripped of its traditionally Christian features. And, further, the fact that in writing a history of modern liberal thought I can profitably devote a great portion of my space to the early fathers is a suggestive illustration of an important fact; namely, that the boasted discoveries of modern lib- eralism are for the most part ancient history, and x Modern Religious Thought. that the Christian Church has prospered in the past (and will probably continue to do so in the future), not by accepting, but by rejecting and combating these alleged discoveries. It is apparent, of course, that the treatment of the theology of the present century is very cur- sory, and that many distinguished names are not mentioned. This was necessary from the limit of space, but may be a real advantage, as it may make the general movement of thought more readily apparent to the reader, than if he were confused with a maze of names and details. While a few of the most prominent thinkers — as Augustine, Kant, Hegel, Schleiermacher — are discussed with a considerable degree of fullness, the work in general is concerned with principles rather than men. It may be full euough for the layman who wishes merely to know something of the general tendency and final result of modern religious thought ; bat I hope the principal use of the work may be to impel theological students to further reading and serve them as a guide through the tangled field of German theological literature. My thanks are due to the instructors in the Harvard Divinity School whom I heard last year in this general field — to Professor Francis G. Introduction. xi Peabody, for his valuable course in the Philoso- phy of Religion, and to Professor John E. Russell, of Williams College, not only for his course on "The Ground and Content of Christian Faith," but for personal criticisms and suggestions. Pro- fessor Russell's keen and discriminating discussion of Kant, Hegel, and Schleiermacher, in the course just mentioned, was of the greatest assistance to me, and has affected at almost every point my estimate of these great thinkers. I divide the subject-matter at the Aufklarung into two general periods. During the first period theology is determined, formally and materially, by traditional churchly and scholastic principles ; in the second period religious thought undergoes a profound modification in form and content, re- sulting from the changed social, ethical, and philo- sophical conditions of modern times. The divid- ing point which I assume is more or less arbitrary and of course somewhat indefinite. The eighteenth century is the battleground of the old orthodoxy against the characteristic principles of modern culture. The latter gradually work out to clear expression in Kant and Hegel, and are formally introduced into the theological field by Schleier- macher. xii Modern Religious Thought. A note is added at the end of the book, giving a brief historical discussion of the Greek Logos doctrine. THE DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT, ESPE- CIALLY IN GERMANY. FIRST PERIOD. THE DEVELOPMENT OF MODERN RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. CHAPTER I. THE RISE OF CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY. /CHRISTIANITY first appeared as a matter ^-^ essentially of the heart and moral life — en- thusiastic love for a crucified Saviour, the redeemer from sin. Its early teachers had small respect for the intellectual speculations of worldly men : " Let no man make spoil of you through his philosophy and vain deceit " (Col. 2:8). It was impossible, however, that the Church should long occupy this position, as Christianity spread throughout the Roman world and came into permanent relations with Greek and Roman culture. Thoughtful men in the Christian community felt impelled to bring the new truth in Christ into harmonious relations with their whole mental life, and became restive under the disdainful assertions of the learned that Christianity was a barbarous superstition to which only fools were called. Hence the attempt to 1 2 Modern Religious Thought, employ the Christian revelation as a means for reaching speculative truth — that is, transforming it from a moral to an intellectual system — and to commend it to the learned as the highest and final philosophy. The impulse to make clear to him- self and exhibit in systematic form the content of his faith and its relation to other spheres of truth is a natural and necessary one for an intelligent Christian — the source and justification of theol- ogy. This attempt, however, manifests a constant tendency to obscure the moral elements of Chris- tianity and run out into a one-sided intellectual- ism. Especially was this true in the conditions existing in the early Christian centuries, when the world of thought was a chaos of effete religions and disintegrating philosophies confusedly min- gled with theosophic speculations and ascetic superstitions from the Orient. Early in the second century (123 A.D.) Aristides, an Athenian philosopher, presented to the Emperor Hadrian an apology for the Christian faith, which is said to have borne the title, " To the Emperor Hadrian Cassar, from the Philosopher Aristides of Athens." 1 The union of Oriental and Chris- tian elements produced various heresies, as the 1 Harnack, I, p. 378. The Rise of Christian Theology. 3 Gnostic ; but "the best Christian thinkers always found Greek philosophy, especially the Socratic, kindred in its aim and spirit because of its lofty and pure ethical conceptions. The earliest extant apologies, those of Justin Martyr, commend the Christian religion to the emperor-philosopher, Antoninus Pius, by comparing Christ to Socrates and representing him as incarnate reason. " And when Socrates endeavored, by true reason and examination, to deliver men from the demons, then the demons themselves, by means of men who rejoiced in iniquity, compassed his death as an atheist and profane person ; and in our case they display a similar activity. For not only among the Greeks did reason (Logos) prevail to condemn these things through Socrates, but also among the barbarians were they condemned by Reason Him- self (Logos), who took shape and became man and was called Christ Jesus." 1 Christian theology, properly so called, found its birthplace at Alexan- dria, the seat of Philo's philosophy ; and the characteristic aim of the Alexandrian school of theology is to combine Christianity and the pro- found and fascinating speculations of the best Greek thinkers kito the final and perfect system 1 First Apology, I, 5. 4 Modern Religious Thought. of truth. The father of Christian theology, Ori- gen, in reply to Celsus, quotes his opponent as saying that " the Greeks are more skillful than any others in judging, establishing, and reducing to practice the discoveries of barbarous nations." Origen proceeds to remark : " Now this is our answer to his allegations and our defense of the truths contained in Christianity — that if any one were to come from the study of Grecian opinions and usages to the gospel, he would not only decide that its doctrines were true, but would by practice establish their truth, and supply whatever seemed wanting from a Grecian point of view to their demonstration, and thus confirm the truth of Christianity." 1 In referring to the system of Origen, Harnack says : " It was at the bottom a philosophical system." 2 It is often remarked, and in the main truly, that the Eastern Church was predominantly speculative, the Western practical ; the first ten- dency leading to the development of theology proper — doctrines of God, person of Christ, etc. — the practical tendency of the West, on the other hand, to the development of anthropology — doctrines of sin and grace. Origen stands as 1 Against Celsus, I, 2. 2 Outlines of History of Dogma, p. 318. The Rise of Christian Theology, 5 the most conspicuous representative of the Eastern Church, which develops rather a philosophy than a theology ; while the great significance of Augus- tine lies in the fact that in him the practical ten- dency of the West finds true expression, yet is preserved from a one-sided extreme by a philosoph- ical temper and insight and a genuine and sym- metrical religious life. He brought theology back from the speculative extremes of the East, restor- ing it to genuinely ethical, religious ground — where the daring flights of speculation were restrained by the authority of the sacred Scriptures and of the true Christian tradition and Christian consciousness which he found in the Catholic Church. The ideal Christian with the Alexandrian School is the "wise man" (Gnostic), as in the purest Greek ethical schools, the Socratic and the Stoic. Clement, the teacher of Origen, says : " It is the greatest of all lessons to know one's self. For if one knows himself, he will know God ; and knowing God he will be made like God, not by wearing gold and long robes but by well-doing, and by requiring as few things as possible." 1 Religion is represented as essentially a matter of 1 Instructor, III, 1. 6 Modem Religious Thought. knowledge. " Could we, then, suppose any one proposing to the Gnostic whether he would choose the knowledge of God or eternal salvation ; and if these, which are entirely identical, were separ- able, he would without the least hesitation choose the knowledge of God, deeming that property of faith which from love ascends to knowledge, desir- able for its own sake." 1 The knowledge of God in mystic contemplation issues in a perfect union with God, after the thought of Philo and the Neo-Platonists. " What is really good is seen to be most pleasant, and of itself produces the fruit which is desired — tranquillity of soul. On this wise it is possible for the Gnostic already to have become God. . . . For, universally, liability to feeling belongs to every kind of desire ; and" man, when deified purely into a passionless state, becomes a unit. In the contemplative life, one in worshiping God attends to himself, and through his own spotless purification beholds God holily ; for self-control, being present, surveying and con- templating itself uninterruptedly, is as far as pos- sible assimilated to God." 2 Gregory Thaumatur- gus, the devoted disciple of Origen, writes of his master's use of the Greek philosophers in his 1 Stromata, IV, 22. * Ibid. IV, 23. The Rise of Christian Theology. 7 teachings : " He was the first and only man that urged me to the study of the Greeks. For he deemed it right for us to study philosophy in such a wise that we should read with utmost diligence all that has been written, both by the philosophers and poets of old, rejecting nothing (for indeed we did not yet possess the power of critical dis- cernment), except only the productions of the atheists." 1 1 Panegyric to Origen, 11, 13. CHAPTER II. ORIGEN. I~N the preface of his great theological treatise, Uep\ 'Apywv, Origen sets up as criteria of Chris- tian truth, the Scriptures and apostolical tradition. " All who believe and are assured that grace and truth were obtained through Jesus Christ derive the knowledge which incites men to a good and happy life from no other source than from the very words and teachings of Christ " — the Scrip- tures of the Old and New Testament. . . . "Since, however, many of those who profess to believe in Christ differ from each other, . . . that alone is to be accepted as truth which differs in no respect from ecclesiastical and apostolical tra- dition." These two sentinels of Christian truth, however, posted so conspicuously at the gateway of the theological edifice, were unable to prevent the entrance of a vast deal entirely foreign to the thought both of Scriptures and apostles. This came about largely because of Origen's allegorical interpretation of the Bible — the method used by Origen, 9 Philo in reconciling the Scriptures and the Greek philosophers. " Then, finally, there is one opinion throughout the whole Church, that the Scriptures were written by the Spirit of God, and have a meaning, not only such as is apparent at first sight, but another, which escapes the notice of most. This spiritual meaning is known to those only on whom the grace of the Holy Spirit is bestowed in wisdom and knowledge." 1 An inter- esting example of Origen 7 s allegorical theory is found in the "Principles," IV, 1 : 16 : " Who is so foolish as to suppose that God, after the manner of a husbandman, planted a paradise in Eden and placed in it a tree of life, visible and palpable, so that one tasting of the fruit by the bodily teeth obtained life? And, again, that one was a par- taker of good and evil by masticating what was taken from the tree ? And if God is said to walk in the Paradise in the evening, and Adam to hide himself under a tree, I do not suppose that any one doubts that these things figuratively indicate certain mysteries, the history having taken place in appearance and not literally." It is not necessary to dwell on Origen's doctrine of God, except to note that it shows the unde- i Iiepl 'Apx<*v, Preface, 8. 10 Modern Religious Thought, veloped nature of the trinitarian doctrine in his day. It is the subordination view, characteristic of Greek theology in general, rinding the ground of the divine unity in the precedence of the Father. "It is clearly delivered in the teaching of the apostles, first, that there is one God, who created and arranged all things, etc. Secondly, that Jesus Christ himself, who came into the world, was born of the Father before all creatures, etc. Then, thirdly, the apostles related that the Holy Spirit was associated in honor and dignity with the Father and the Son. But in his case it is not clearly distinguished whether he is to be regarded as born or innate (uncreated), or also as a son of God or not ; for these are points which have to be inquired into out of Sacred Scripture." 1 The trinitarian controversies of the third and fourth centuries do not concern us. Augustine deter- mined the form of the trinitarian doctrine for the Western Church, asserting the procession of the Spirit from both the Father and the Son. In his doctrine of the Son, Origen's emphasis is on Christ as the Word or Wisdom, through par- ticipation in whom creatures become rational. " God the Father bestows upon all existence ; and 1 iiepL 'Apx&v, Preface. Origen. 11 participation in Christ, in respect of his being the Word of reason, renders them rational beings. The grace of the Holy Spirit is present, that those beings which are not holy in their essence may be rendered holy by participation in it. . . . That those whom he has created may be unceasingly and inseparably present with Him Who Is, it is the business of Wisdom to instruct and train them, and to bring them to perfection by confirmation of his Holy Spirit and unceasing sanctification, by which alone they are capable of receiving God. In this way then shall we be able at some future time, perhaps, to behold the holy and blessed life in which we ought so to continue that no satiety of that blessedness should ever seize us — while we ever more eagerly and freely receive and hold fast the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. But if satiety should ever take hold of any one of those who stand on the highest and perfect sum- mit of attainment, I do not think that such an one would suddenly be deposed from his position and fall away, but that he must decline gradually and little by little." * This passage is essentially Platonic in thought, and the lucid and elegant style reminds of the poet-philosopher of Greece. 1 Ilepi 'Apxiov, I, 3. 12 Modern Religious Thought, Wisdom trains its pupils for the higher life, as the captives of the Cave figure of the Republic are led up to the ideal world ; and the fall of the hap- less spirits who tire of the ecstatic vision is a feeble echo of the Phsedrus. Substitute the vision of the world of ideas for " holding fast to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost," and "the back of heaven " for "the highest and perfect summit of attain- ment," and you have the souls in the train of Zeus, coming out and standing on the back of heaven, to gaze out upon the world of ideas, when some through carelessness fall away, their wings are broken, and they descend to the world of sense. "For the immortal souls go out and stand upon the back of heaven, and the revolution of the spheres carries them around, and they behold the world beyond. . . . During the revolution the soul beholds justice, temperance, and knowledge abso- lute, not in the form of generation or of relation, which men call existence, but knowledge absolute in existence absolute. . . . But when the soul fails to behold the vision of truth, and through some ill-hap sinks beneath the double load of for- getfulness and vice, and her feathers fall from her and she drops to earth, then the law ordains that this soul shall pass in the first generation into that Origen. 13 of a man." 1 This Christian Platonism of Origen is interesting and beautiful and may possibly be true; but this Logos — Wisdom — who leads his disci- ples up out of the disturbing cares of the world to serene heights of philosophic contemplation is not the Saviour of Paul, burdened with an awful load of moral guilt, and crying, " Who shall de- liver me from the body of this death ? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord." For Origen, therefore, the fall of man is in the preexistent state, instead of in Adam as with Augustine. Mortal being exists as a shadowy copy of the Divine Being, much as with Plato earthly things have only a derived existence by partaking of the nature of the idea. In the fol- lowing passage there seems to be also the sugges- tion of an analogy between the Trinity and Plato's god, the Idea of goodness. " For in the Trinity alone, which is the author of all things, does goodness exist in virtue of essential being, while others possess it as an accidental and perish- able quality, and only then enjoy blessedness when they participate in holiness and wisdom aud in divinity itself." 2 In falling from the heavenly state souls are assigned different grades of being, 1 Pasedrus, Jowett, I, pp. 552 and 553. 2 ITepi 'Apx&v, I, 6. 14 Modern Religious Thought. according to their moral desert ; some angels, some principalities, powers, thrones, etc. ; as with Plato, according as a soul has seen more or less of truth, it becomes a philosopher, king, politician, physician, etc. 1 All the fallen spirits are to be finally restored. " We think, indeed, that the goodness of God through his Christ may restore all his creatures to one end, even his enemies being conquered and subdued. . . . Those who have been removed from their primal state of blessedness have not been removed irrecoverably, but have been placed under the rule of these holy and blessed orders, that they may recover them- selves and be restored to their condition of hap- piness." In the chapter " On the End of the World," 2 Origen says : " I am of the opinion that the expression by which God is said to be ' all in all,' means that he is all in each individual per- son. Now he will be ' all ' in each individual in this way; when all which any rational under- standing, cleansed from the dregs of every sort of vice and with every cloud of wickedness com- pletely swept away, can either feel or understand or think, will be only God ; and when it will no longer behold or retain anything else than God, iPhaedrus, Jowett, I, p. 553. 2 Ilepl 'Apx^v, III, 6= Origen. 15 but when God will be the measure and standard of all its movements." (We find here suggested Clement's Neo-Platonic vision of God and absorp- tion into the divine.) A full-fledged doctrine of transmigration is not lacking to prove Origen's loyalty to his master in philosophy :• " The souls having been for many ages, so to speak, improved by this stern method of training, advancing through each grade to a better condition, reach even to that which is invisible and eternal, having traveled through by way of training every single office of the heavenly powers." l He is uncertain, however, as to the restoration of the Satanic powers, anticipating Joseph Cook in suggesting fixedness of character as justifying eternal punish- ment. " But whether any of those orders who act under the government of the devil will in a future world be converted to righteousness, or whether persistent and inveterate wickedness may be changed by the power of nature into habit, is a result which you yourself, reader, may approve of." 1 In the chapter " On the Soul," 2 we might find Plato's doctrine of eternally exist- ing souls, as their origin is left entirely unex- plained ; the divine creation, however, elsewhere 1 Ilepi. 'Apx<*>v, I, 6. - IT, 8. 16 Modern Religious Thought, stated, 1 is doubtless assumed. " We have to inquire whether perhaps the name soul, which in Greek is termed