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A Lutheran Professor Educated at Westminster Theological Seminary Looks for Similarities and Dissimilarities Richard E Volume 61:Numbers 1-2 January-April1997 Table of Contents The Porvoo Common Statement Prepared by the Fourth Plenary Meeting held at Jarvenpaii, Finland, 9-13 October 1992 .... 3 The Porvoo Declaration in Confessional Perspective The Departments of Systematic Theology: Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Concordia Seminary, Saint Louis, Missouri.. .................................. 35 The Holy Spirit in the Augsburg Confession: A Reformed Perspective Richard A. Muller ........................... 53 A Lutheran Professor Trained at Westminster Looks for Similarities and Dissimilarities Richard E. Muller ............................ 79 Cum Patre et Filio Adoratur: The Holy Spirit Understood Christologically David P. Scaer ............................... 93 Saint Polycarp of Smyrna: Johannine or Pauline Figure? D. RichardStuckwisch. ...................... 113 Books Received ................................... 126 Book Reviews ....................................127 Emanuel Hirsch und Paul Tillich: Theologie und Politik in einer Zeit der Krise. By A. James Reirner ..........Lowell C. Green The Descent of God: Divine Suffering in Histoy and Theology. By Joseph M. Hallman ........Jeffery A. Oschwald Adolf Schlatter: A Biography of Germany's Premier Biblical Theologian. By Werner Neuer .......... William C. Weinrich Martin Luther in Two Centuries: The Sixteenth and the Twentieth. By Helmar Junghans ...............Paul J. Grime A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada. By Mark A. Noll ..........................Robert E. Smith True Faith in the True God: An Introduction to Luther's Life and Thought. By Hans Schwarz .......... Martin Noland Baptized into God's Family: The Doctrine of Infant Baptism for Today. By A. Andrew Das ............ James W. Kalthoff Paul's Letter to the Romans: A Cornmentay. By Peter Stuhlmacher ..........................Jonathan F. Grothe Genesis 1-11: From Eden to Babel. By Donald Gowan .......................................Dean 0. Wenthe I Believe but I Have Questions. By Jane L. Fryar . James E. Butler Christian Moral Judgment. By J. Philip Wogaman .....................................Terrence Reynolds Giving Goliath His Due: New Archaeological Light on the Philistines. By Neal Bierling ..............Thomas H. Trapp Windows on the World of Jesus: Time Travel to Ancient Judea. By Bruce Malina ......................Charles A. Gieschen Islam: An Introduction for Christians. Edited by Paul Martinson; Leader's Guide by Irene Getz ............... Henry Rowold Canon and Theology: Overtures to an Old Testament Theology. By Rolf Rendtorff ......................... Henry Rowold Indices to Volume 60 (1996) Index of Authors and Editors ..................... 153 Index of Titles ................................... 154 Index of Book Reviews ........................... 156 A Lutheran Professor Educated at Westminster Theological Seminary Looks for Similarities and Dissimilarities Richard E. Muller This article opens with some comments on theological education at Westminster Theological Semianry, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the late 1960s. It then outlines the general Reformed or Calvinistic approach to the topic of the Holy Spirit: The Person of the Holy Spirit; The Work of the Holy Spirit; The Holy Spirit and Scripture; The Holy Spirit and Sanctification; and The Holy Spirit and Soteriology. Each section will consider briefly the similarities and dissimilarities between Reformed theology and Lutheran theology. Finally, the concluding portion of the article will consist of a few comments in response to Dr. Richard A. MuUer's fine article, "The Holy Spirit in the Augsburg Confession: a Reformed Definition."' Theological Education at Westminster Westminster in the 1960s espoused an authentic Calvinistic Reformed theology. It blended the British Puritan tradition with the Five Point Dutch T-U-L-I-P Calvinism and emphasized strongly the Sovereignty of God. In short, what it taught was consistent with how the Reformed have traditionally done theology - from the fixed point of the Sovereignty of God and the decrees of God, including the secret or hidden decrees. In contrast Lutherans do theology by focusing on the Crucified God, or the Cross of Christ and the revealed knowledge of God. This author 'At the Eighteenth Annual Symposium of the Lutheran Confessions in January 1995 I responded to Dr. Richard A. Muller's "The Holy Spirit in the Augsburg Confession: A Reformed Definition." I was chosen for this task because of the similarity of our names (to the best of our knowledge we are not related) and more importantly because I received my basic theological education at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from which I graduated in 1967. Richard E. Muller is Associate Professor of Systematic Theology at Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Indiana. never felt at ease with, what Luther and his followers refer to as, "the theology of glory." The practical ramifications of this approach are enormous. Some professors at Westminster taught that one could not tell a group consisting of Christians and non-Christians that Christ died for their sins. One could only tell them that Christ died for their sins ifthey were of the elect. This was an application of the infamous "L" in the Calvinistic T-U-LI-P-the "limited atonement" theory. Such a theology changes the comfort the Gospel is designed to provide for the sinner into a spiritual problem of considerable magnitude which confronts the sinner. Under the "limited atonement" concept a basic shift takes place in doing theology. The Deus Reveibfus, the Eternal Word through whom the Father creates and reveals, and which culminates with the death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, is exchanged for that of the Deus Abscondifus or the eternal and, therefore, hidden God of the "secret decrees." According to Deuteronomy 29:29 the "secret decrees" are God's secret possession and one therefore dare not do theology on the basis of them. Theologians ought not work in the area of archetypal theology, or God's knowledge of himself, but must be totally dependent upon ectypal theology, or God's revealed knowledge of himself. With this distinction in mind between the Revealed God and the Hidden God, or between the Word of God and the Will or Decrees of God, let us now consider specifically the place of the Holy Spirit in the Reformation perspective of Calvinism and of Lutheranism and search for similarities and dissimilarities. The Person of the Holy Spirit In considering the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, theologians distinguish between the person of the Holy Spirit and the work of the Holy Spirit. In regard to the person of the Holy Spirit there is more similarity than dissimilarity between confessional Calvinism and confessional Lutheranism. Both the Reformed and Lutheran traditions, coming as they do from the sixteenth century, hold to the full and unqualified deity of the Third Person. This similarity is based not only on agreement with the Lutherans and the Reformed 81 testimony of Holy Scripture, but also on the common acceptance of the ancient ecumenical creeds. While there is admittedly a significant dissimilarity in the Calvinistic and Lutheran understanding and confession of the person of Christ, especially the genus maiestaticum, this is not true of the confession of the person of the Holy Spirit.2The only point at issue in a confession of the person of the Holy Spirit is that of his full deity, and here the Calvinists and Lutherans agree. Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion, while not technically a confession, functions practically as the foundational document upon which all Reformed Confessions are set and judged. In the ~nstihttes,Calvin says the following in regard to the person of the Holy Spirit: Because he is circumscribed by no limits, he is excepted from the category of creatures; but in transfusing into all things his energy, and breathing into them essence, life, and movement, he is indeed plainly di~ine.~ In short, upon him, as upon the Son, are conferred functions that especially belong to divinity. Paul, therefore, very clearly attributes to the Spirit divine power, and shows that He resides hypostatically in ~od.~ Nor, indeed, does Scripture in speaking of him refrain from the designation, 'God.I5 Qf course, the confession of the person of the Spirit is far less complex and complicated than that of the Christ since only the Christ was incarnate. The whole issue of the mysterious relationship of the two natures to the one person, which received its classical formulation in Chalcedon in 451, does not apply to the Third Person. 'institutes, I.XIII.14,138. All references are to John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, edited by John T. McNeill, translated by Ford Lewis Battles, The Library of Christian Classics volumes 20-21 (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1W). 'Institutes, LXIII.14,139. 51nstitutes, LMII.15,139. The same testimony is found also in the Westminster Larger Cate~hism.~ Question #9. How many persons are there in the Godhead? Answer - There be three persons in the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and these three are one true, eternal God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory; although distinguished by their personal properties. So also the Westminster Confession, Chapter 11.111: In the unity of the Godhead there be three persons, of one substance, power, and eternity; God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. I John 5:7; Matt.
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