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SPRING 2014 • VOLUME 11, NUMBER 1 Spring 2014 • Vol. 11, No. 1 The Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary Editor-in-Chief 2014 EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Charles S. Kelley, Th.D. Bart Barber, Ph.D. Executive Editor First Baptist Church of Farmersville, TX Steve W. Lemke, Ph.D. Rex Butler, Ph.D. Editor & BCTM Director New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary Adam Harwood, Ph.D. Managing Editor Nathan Finn, Ph.D. Suzanne Davis Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary Research Assistant Eric Hankins, Ph.D. Patrick Cochran First Baptist Church, Oxford, MS Book Review Editors Archie England, Ph.D. Malcolm Yarnell, Ph.D. Dennis Phelps, Ph.D. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary The Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry is a research institute of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. The seminary is located at 3939 Gentilly Blvd., New Orleans, LA 70126. BCTM exists to provide theological and ministerial resources to enrich and energize ministry in Baptist churches. Our goal is to bring together professor and practitioner to produce and apply these resources to Baptist life, polity, and ministry. The mission of the BCTM is to develop, preserve, and communicate the distinctive theological identity of Baptists. The Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry is published semiannually by the Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry. Copyright ©2014 The Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. All Rights Reserved. CONTACT BCTM (800) 662-8701, ext. 8074 [email protected] www.baptistcenter.com SUBMISSIONS Visit the Baptist Center web site for submission guidelines. TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial Introduction 1 Adam Harwood Justification in Marius Victorinus’ Pauline Commentaries: Sola Fide, Solo Christo, and Sola Gratia Dei 3 Dongsun Cho John Smyth and Thomas Helwys: Theological Differences 26 Joe Early Toward a Non-Deterministic Theology of Divine Providence 38 Robert E. Picirilli Calvinism vs. Molinism: Paul Helm & William Lane Craig 62 Paul Helm and William Lane Craig Articles of Religious Belief: The Confession Authored by the Founders of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary 78 Steve W. Lemke Book Reviews 100 Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry Vol. 11, No. 1 © 2014 Editorial Introduction Adam Harwood, Ph.D. Adam Harwood is Associate Professor of Theology, occupying the McFarland Chair of Theology; Director of the Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry; Editor,Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. his issue of the journal features five articles from the fields of historical and systematic Ttheology, and sixteen book reviews from the fields of apologetics, world religions, biblical studies, biblical theology, and systematic theology. The first article was written by Dongsun Cho, Assistant Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. His publications include “Ambrosiaster on Justification by Faith Alone in His Commentaries on the Pauline Epistles,” The Westminster Theological Journal 74.2 (Fall 2012): 277-90. In the present article, Cho argues that fourth-century theologian Marius Victorinus is the first Latin father who identified in Paul’s writings the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Joe Early is Associate Professor of Theology at Campbellsville University. Among his many publications, he is the author of The Life and Writings of Thomas Helwys: The First English Baptist (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2009). In the second article in this issue, Early compares the theology of the earliest progenitors of the Baptist movement, John Smyth (1570–1612) and Thomas Helwys (1575–1612). Robert E. Picirilli served as Academic Dean and Professor of Greek and New Testament at Free Will Baptist Bible College (now Welch College) in Nashville, Tennessee. He served as General Editor of the Randall House Bible Commentary and contributed five commentaries to the series. Also, he is the author of several books, including Grace, Faith, Free Will (Nashville: Randall House, 2002). In this issue’s third article, Picirilli interacts with traditional, systematic treatments of the doctrine of providence in order to offer a non-deterministic construction of the doctrine. The fourth article is a transcript of a conversation between Paul Helm and William Lane Craig on Calvinism and Molinism which was recorded by “Unbelievable?” with Justin Brierley (Premier Christian Radio) on January 4, 2014. Helm, Teaching Fellow at Regent College in Vancouver, British Columbia, has authored several books on Calvinism, including Calvin and the Calvinists (Banner of Truth, 1982) and John Calvin’s Ideas (Oxford University Press, 2005). Craig is Research Professor of Philosophy at Talbot School of Theology in La Mirada, California, JBTM Adam Harwood 2 and Professor of Philosophy at Houston Baptist University in Houston, Texas. His publications include an extended case for middle knowledge, also known as Molinism, in The Only Wise God: The Compatibility of Divine Foreknowledge & Human Freedom (Baker, 1987). The article includes colloquialisms because it is a conversation rather than an academic presentation. Both men are respected advocates of their respective views, and it is a delight to publish this conversation for a wider audience. In the fifth article, Steve W. Lemke, Provost at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, examines the historical-theological background of the seminary’s first confession of faith, the Articles of Religious Belief (1918). A version of this article was delivered as the Founder’s Day Address at the NOBTS Chapel in October of 2013. Lemke has made a significant contribution to the field of Baptist studies; I am unaware of another article which traces the historical-theological roots of this important confessional statement. May God be glorified by these articles and reviews, and may they enrich your knowledge of and service to God. JBTM 3 Justification in Marius Victorinus’ Pauline Commentaries: Sola Fide, Solo Christo, and Sola Gratia Dei Dongsun Cho, Ph.D. Dongsun Cho is Assistant Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Introduction lister McGrath claims in his magnum opus, Iustitia Dei, “Justification was simply not a Atheological issue in the pre-Augustinian tradition …. To be sure, he [Paul] is honoured and quoted, but—in the theological perspective of the west—it seems that Paul’s great insight into justification by faith was forgotten.”1 For McGrath, Augustine is the first Latin theologian who presents a meaningful doctrine of justification, although Augustine’s doctrine of justification is similar to the Roman Catholic doctrine of justification and does not anticipate the Reformers’ instantaneous and declarative justification based on imputed and alien righteousness.2 According to McGrath, no one can find an antecedent of the Reformational understanding of justification among the church fathers prior to and even in Augustine. Recently, however, some Protestant scholars have attested to a meaningful development of a patristic doctrine of justification by faith prior to Augustine. Thomas Oden, inThe Justification Reader; Nick Needham, in “Justification in the Early Church Fathers”; and Daniel H. Williams, in “Justification by Faith: A Patristic Doctrine” and “Hilary of Poitiers and Justification by Faith,” show that some patristic exegetes indeed held to justification by faith apart from human, meritorious works.3 Williams attributes McGrath and other Protestants’ failure to recognize an early, patristic 1Alister E. McGrath, Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification, 3rd ed. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 34. Iustitia Dei has become a classical monograph on the historical development of the doctrine of justification. Despite some disagreements with McGrath, N. T. Wright, Jus- tification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2009), 79, recommends Iustitia Dei as “required reading for anyone who wants seriously to engage with” the history of the doctrine of justification. 2McGrath, Iustitia Dei, 38–39, “Augustine’s doctrine of justification is the first discussion of the matter of major significance to emerge from the twilight of the western theological tradition.” For McGrath’s evalu- ation of Augustine’s doctrine of justification, see ibid., 43–49. 3Thomas Oden, The Justification Reader (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006); Daniel H. Williams, “Justi- fication by Faith: A Patristic Doctrine,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 57.4 (2006): 649–67, idem, “Hilary of Poitiers and Justification by Faith According to the Gospel of Matthew,” Pro Ecclessia 16 (2007): 445–61; JBTM Dongsun Cho 4 doctrine of justification by faith to their “outmoded view that post-apostolic Christianity was corrupted by the vagaries of Hellenism.”4 The three scholars’ common observation of the ancient writers’ teaching of sola fide does not necessarily indicate their agreement concerning how much theological affinity may exist between the ancient writers and the Reformers on justification. Oden proposes a provocative thesis that there is substantial textual evidence of the theological “consensus” with regard to sola fide between patristic writers and the Reformers.5 The popular assumption that the early church quickly departed from the doctrine of justification by faith alone is “an intemperate idea,” which is “neglectful
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