LIBRARY ONLY for USf. in PER BV 4070 . P712 N.S. v . 14 c . 2 Princeton Theological Seminary. The Princeton Seminary ' lletin • *1 3 COpp Z FOR USE IN LIBRARY ONLY THE PRINCETON SEMINARY BULLETIN VOLUME XIV, NUMBER I NEW SERIES 1993 The Re-Forming Tradition : Presbyterians and Mainstream Protestantism : A Review edward a. dowey The Mainstream Protestant “Decline”: The Presbyterian Pattern : A Review RICHARD K. FENN Scripture as the Word of God SANDRA M. SCHNEIDERS Two Caribbean Theologies of Freedom: The Romney Moseley-Kortright Davis Debate kortricht davis What Is “Theological” about Theological Education? Thomas w. gillespie Sermons February Is the Longest Month steven j. kraftchick City Rainbows DANIEL L. MIGLIORE PRINCETON THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY Thomas W. Gillespie, President BOARD OF TRUSTEES Johannes R. Krahmer, Chair Robert M. Adams, Vice Cha Louise Upchurch Lawson. Secretary Clarence B. Ammons David M. Mace Fred R. Anderson Kari Turner McClellan Helen Mabry Beglin M. Scott McClure Eve S. Bogle Donald C. McFerren Robert W. Bohl Anne Kimrey Myers Warren D. Chinn Young Pai John H. Donelik Earl F. Palmer Peter E. B. Erdman Jean M. Rech Rosemary Hall Evans Barbara A, Renton Sarah B. Gambrell Thomas J. Rosser Francisco O. Garcia-Treto Laird H. Simons. Jr. C. Thomas Hilton Thomas K. Tewell David H. Hughes William P. Thompson Jane G. Irwin Jay Vawter F. Martin Johnson David B. Watermulder Justin M. Johnson George B. Wirth Thomas R. Johnson Charles Wright Henry Luce III Ralph M. Wyman TRUSTEES EMERITI AE Clem E. Bininger J. Keith Louden Frederick E. Christian George T. Piercy Margaret W. Harmon William H. Scheide Bryant M. Kirkland John M. Templeton Harry G. Kuch Samuel G. Warr Raymond I. Lindquist Irving A. West 1 THE PRINCETON SEMINARY BULLETIN VOLUME XIV NUMBER I NEW SERIES 1993 Daniel L. Migliore, editor James F. Kay, book review editor Steven R. Bechtler, editorial assistant CONTENTS The Re-Forming Tradition: Presbyterians and Mainstream Protestantism : A Review Edward A. Dowey 1 The Mainstream Protestant "Decline”: The Presbyterian Pattern : A Review Richard K. Penn 1 Scripture as the Word of God Sandra M. Schneiders 18 Two Caribbean Theologies of Freedom: The Romney Moseley-Kortright Davis Debate Kortright Davis 36 What Is “Theological” about Theological Education? Thomas W. Gillespie 55 Sermons February Is the Longest Month Steven ]. Kraftchicly 64 City Rainbows Daniel L. Migliore 68 Book Reviews The Gospel of Peace: A Scriptural Message for Today’s World, by Ulrich Mauser Gordon Zerbe 72 Belonging to God: A Commentary on “A Brief Statement of Faith,” by William C. Placher and David Willis-Watkins I. John Hesselink^ 73 Black Religious Leaders: Conflict in Unity, by Peter Paris William J. M. Howard, Jr. 74 THE PRINCETON SEMINARY BULLETIN Biblical Hermeneutics in Historical Perspective: Studies in Honor of Karlfried Froehlich on His Sixtieth Birthday, ed. Mark S. Burrows and Paul Rorem George Lawless 76 Exodus, by Terence E. Fretheim Dennis T. Olson 78 First, Second, and Third John, by D. Moody Smith Martinus C. de Boer 79 Metaphor and Composition in i Peter, by Troy W. Martin Steven Richard Bechtler 81 How to Read Karl Barth: The Shape of His Theology, by George OO Hunsinger Clifford Green rT) Systematic Theology, vol. i, by Wolfhart Pannenberg, trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley Ronald Cole-Turner OO The Promise of Trinitarian Theology, by Colin E. Gunton Stephen L. Stell OO Judaism: Between Yesterday and Tomorrow, by Hans Kiing Joel Marcus 89 Loving Nature: Ecological Integrity and Christian Responsibility, by James A. Nash Charles C. West 90 Christianity: A Social and Cultural History, by Howard Clark Kee, Emily Albu Hanawalt, Carter Lindberg, Jean-Loup Seban, and Mark A. Noll Christopher Ocker 9 1 The Shaping of the Reformed Baptismal Rite in the Sixteenth Century, by Hughes Oliphant Old Elsie McKee 95 Modern American Religion, vol. 2, The Noise of Conflict, 1919- 1941, by Martin E. Marty Henry Warner Bowden 97 The Presbyterian Controversy: Fundamentalists, Modernists, and Moderates, by Bradley J. Longfield James H. Smylie 98 Sealed in Christ: The Symbolism of the Seal of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), by John M. Mulder Donald Macleod IOI What Happens Sunday Morning: A Layperson’s Guide to Worship, by Carol M. Noren Fred R. Anderson 102 The Embodied Word: Preaching as Art and Liturgy, by Charles L. Rice Horace T. Allen, Jr. io3 Handbook of Themes for Preaching, ed. James W. Cox William J. Carl III 104 Sharing Faith: A Comprehensive Approach to Religious Education and Pastoral Ministry, by Thomas H. Groome Carol Lakey Hess 106 CONTENTS iii Helping Teenagers Grow Morally: A Guide for Adults, by C. Ellis Nelson Bradley Wigger 107 The Abuse of Power: A Theological Problem, by James Newton Poling Christie Cozad Neuger 109 The Princeton Seminary Bulletin is published three times annually by Princeton Theological Sem- inary, Princeton, New Jersey. Each issue is mailed free of charge to all alumni/ae and on an exchange basis with various insti- tutions. Back issues are not available. All correspondence should be addressed to Daniel L. Migliore, Editor, Princeton Seminary Bul- letin, CN 821, Princeton, NJ 08542. Because the policy of the Bulletin is to publish lectures and sermons by Princeton Seminary faculty and administration, and presentations by guests on the Seminary campus, we do not accept unsolicited material. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2016 with funding from Princeton Theological Seminary Library https://archive.org/details/princetonseminar1411prin \ — The Re-Forming Edward A. Dowey is the Archibald Alex- ander Professor Emeritus of the History of Tradition : Presbyterians Christian Doctrine at Princeton Theologi- cal Seminary. He is the author of The and Mainstream Knowledge of God in Calvin’s Theol- ogy and A Commentary on the Confes- l Protestantism A Review sion of 1967 and an Introduction to the Book of Confessions. by Edward A. Dowey How to Read These Books he gargantuan “case study” of mainstream American Protestant de- Tcline called The Presbyterian Presence: The Twentieth-Century Expe- rience—the production of about sixty scholars over roughly five years—is now complete in seven unnumbered paperback volumes heavily and repet- itively documented, filling 2,300 pages. 2 Funded by the Lilly Endowment and edited by Louisville Presbyterian Seminary faculty members, Librarian Milton J Coalter, President John M. Mulder, and Dean Louis B. Weeks all historians of American Christianity— it is a path-breaking and a back- breaking achievement for authors and readers, respectively. Whatever the verdict on individual articles or critique of the whole, the mass of research and variety of subjects covered by competent professionals make it a land- mark work. The “Series Foreword” is repeated in each volume, and an introduction to each by the general editors summarizes in advance what one is about to read and offers an ongoing orientation. Nonetheless, it is only in the final volume, The Re-Forming Tradition, that there is even a table of contents of the whole sequence in proper order together with a listing of each chapter title and author (pp. 336-344). The place to begin, therefore, is at the end, with this map of the whole. Indices are both copious and capricious, and so it pays to make one’s own on favorite subjects. ' Edited by Milton J Coalter, John M. Mulder, and Louis B. Weeks, The Presbyterian Presence: The Twentieth-Century Experience (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1992). 2 Edited by Milton J Coalter, John M. Mulder, and Louis B. Weeks, and published by Westminster/John Knox Press (Louisville), the volumes are: The Presbyterian Predicament: Six Perspectives (1990); The Confessional Mosaic: Presbyterians and Twentieth -Century Theology (1990); The Mainstream Protestant "Decline": The Presbyterian Pattern (1990); The Diversity of Discipleship: Presbyterians and Twentieth -Century Christian Witness (1991); The Organizational Revolution: Presbyterians and American Denommationalism (1992); The Pluralistic Vision: Pres- byterians and Mainstream Protestant Education and Leadership (1992); The Re-Forming Tradi- tion: Presbyterians and Mainstream Protestantism (1992). THE PRINCETON SEMINARY BULLETIN Individual articles appear to be assignments from the editors, and authors show little awareness of how the same or closely related subjects are treated by fellow contributors. The coherence comes from the overall plan—de- vised entirely in advance, it would seem—with no inter-issue debate and no effort to relate the works except by arrangement of proximity and by edi- torial comment. Methods vary among the chapters from arbitrary miscel- lany, to explicit and admirable analysis, to method-bound unreality. Such observations show the mountainous problems faced in organizing such a project, and one feels admiration for the editors for handling such unwieldy subjects, some appearing here for the first time and some well known. As one would expect, and the editors state candidly, there was not unanimous agreement among them, even in preparing their common text for this last book. A study guide is available, which the present writer has not seen. But I offer the above comments as the experience of one reader hoping to be of practical help to others. A General Critique3 For so large a project as The Presbyterian Presence series, either failure or success would seem likely to appear on a grand scale. And so it has hap- pened. Indeed, both are writ large with publication of the final volume, The Re-Forming Tradition. Here, the three senior editors, in deep personal agony as lifelong Presbyterians (p. 30), offer skillful summaries and evaluations, and then try mightily to produce something positive from the foregoing mass of negativity. Quickly put, (1) the successful, instructive result of the series is an im- mensely informative, dispassionate, and quite devastating “case study” of “mainstream” Protestant institutional decline in membership and cultural impact, along with confusion in mission and internal fragmentation of com- munity, message, and theology.