Mid-March 1933

CHRISTIA,.TY. TODAY A PRESBYTERIAN JOURNAL DEVOTED TO STATING, DEFENDING III AND FURTHERING THE GOSPEL IN THE MODERN WORLD III SAMUEL G. CRAIG, Editor H. McALLISTER GRIFFITHS, Managing Editor Published monthly by MID-MARCH, 1933 $1.00 A YEAR EVERYWHERE THE PRESBYTERIAN AND Entered as second-cia .. maHer May 11, 1931, al REFORMED PUBLISHING CO., Vol. 3 No.11 the Post Omce al Philadelphia, Pa., under the 501 Witherspoon Bldg., Phila., Pa. Act 01 March 3, 1879. CANDIDATES IN AND OUT Editorial Notes and Comments r-----,N our January issue we noted the fact that Dr. WILLIAM HIRAM FOULKES had been put forward as a ASSOCIA nON FOR THE REEMPHASIS OF NEW Candidate for Moderator of the forthcoming As sembly. Inasmuch as Dr. FOULKES represents a TESTAMENT MISSIONS point of view in the Church with which we are r-----.HE formation of an organization to oppose the r4 not in agreement, we expressed ourselves as not adoption of the recommendations of the Laymen's being in favor of his candidacy. The "organization" Foreign Mission Inquiry to be known as "The has apparently decided to back someone else, for Association for the Reemphasis of New Testament -~ Dr. FOULKES has now of his own motion taken him- Missions" has been announced. This association, self out of the running. according to newspaper reports, is the result of a The latest name to be mentioned is that of Dr. JOHN MuDoWELL, series of luncheon conferences that have been held a Secretary of the Board of National Missions. That Dr. Mc in the Calvary Baptist Church of New York City DOWELL has great abilities no one can deny, but that these and will be headed by the Rev. Dr. JOHN W. BRAD abilities have been directed to the maintenance and defense of the BURY, pastor of the Wadsworth Avenue Baptist faith, no one would have the naivete to affirm. Dr. McDOWELL'S Church of that city. Its executive committee includes promi election would please manY,-particularly those whose chief nent ministers and laymen from various evangelical denomin'l interest is in the Church as a piece of machinery, and advocates tions. A mass meeting in its interest has been announced to be of the so-called "social gospel." But it would not please those held Monday evening, March 20, in Calvary Baptist Church who want to get back to the power of the Gospel of the Blood, of New York City of which the Rev. Dr. Wn.L H. HOUGHTON is and away from Modernism in thought and emphasis. The Church pastor-a meeting that will have been held before this issue of should look further. CHRISTIANITY TODAY reaches its readers. That there is need of such an organization is unquestionable. It is heartening to read the statement attributed to Dr. BRAD DR. VAN TIL'S INDICTMENT OF BUCHMAN ISM BURY, to wit: "The authoritative nature of the appraisal report has seriously disturbed the confidence of many in the whole mis '------'HE B_4.NNER, the organ of the Christian Reformed sionary enterprise. At a time of deep religious depression, it Church, in its issue of February 10th, contains' an comes to dampen ardor and to discourage faith. Realizing the extended review and criticism of A. J. RUSSELL'S need of faCing the distinct modernism of the report and the book For Sinners Only "a book written by a Buch dire need of repudiating its misinterpretation of missions as manite about Buchmanism"-by Professor CORNELIUS a human enterprise, we have formed a group of representatives VAN TIL of Westminster Seminary. Dr. VAN TIL'S of many denominations and assemblies to reaffirm our faith in competency for this task cannot be successfully and support of Christian missions." God grant that this as challenged_ We content ourselves with citing cer· sociation may realize its aim ."to rally to the standard of Chris tain passages indicative of his main criticisms tian miSSions every loyal Christian in the land." together with the "summing up" with which he But while we rejoiced when we learned that an association concludes. Some of the more Significant passages follow: had been formed to oppose the so-called Laymen's report this "Buchmanism is typically modern because a typicallY modern rejoiCing waned considerably when the newspapers reported ist movement. This may be seen from the method it employs that Dr. BRADBURY had declared that this particular associa in the spreading of its principles as well as from these prin tion "marked a cleavage between humanism and evangelism ciples themselves." rather than between modernism and fundamentalism." If this "Christianity is the truth and truth cannot even be brought means that the association is going to oppose humanism on to the threshold of one's mind except by conceptual presenta the mission field but that it is not going to oppose modernism tion. You cannot 'intrigue' the imagination of an audience with we think that the sooner it is disbanded the better. It is dif the real person and work of CHRIST unless you tell people plainly ficult to believe that such is the case, in view of the make-up and simply what the person and work of CHRIST is. Add to this of its executive committee, but such a statement on the part of that there are several 'CHRIST'S' today with which Modernists its president is certainly disturbing. No doubt the aims and are seeking to 'intrigue' men's imaginations and it becomes ap purposes of the association will find full statement in connec parent how utterly unsound, both theologically and psycho tion with the mass meeting on the 20th of March. In the logically, Buchmanism is. The whole movement fits in with meantime we view its formation with hope mingled with dread. the anti-intellectualism of our day." (A Table of Contents wi!! be found on Page 24) 2 CHRISTIANITY- TODAY March,1933 "The utter subjectivism of the whole movement appears at A CONSERVATIVE LOOKS TO BARTH AND BRUNNER this point (its teaching as to guidance) perhaps more strikingly than elsewhere. The notion of Scripture as the only infallible r-----,NDER the above title Dr. HOLMES ROLSTON has rule of faith and practice is set aside completely. For being written and the Cokes bury Press has published guided by the Spirit into the truth, as revealed in Scripture, another interpretation of the Barthian Theology 'Frank' and 'Sam' have substituted the modernist notion of the a phase of theological thinking that has gained 'Christian consciousness.' It is not to be wondered at that they great momentum ln Eurol?e and that is gaining in are never 'guided' to a simple presentation of the atonement creasing interest and acceptance in America. through the blood of Calvary." Dr. ROLSTON, a young minister of the Southern "One does not find that 'Frank' ever presents the biblical Presbyterian Church, writes under the limitation doctrine of sin and eternal punishment. ... Never a word of of having a first hand knowledge of only those guilt before GOD! Never a word of 'born and conceived in sin.' writings of BARTH and BRUNNER that have been Pout It is this Pelagianism ... that appeals to men." into English together with the books on the movement they represent written by such British and American scholars as "All the changing of lives as reported in RUSSELL'S book are HOYLE, MCCONNACHIE, ZEllBE and PAUCK, supplemented by affected without reference to the atoning blood of CHRIST, which magazine articles that have appeared in various British and has washed away our guilt. There is a mention of the cross American periodicals. Dr. WALTER LOWRIE's volume Our Con here and there, but always in such a way that many non-Chris· cern with the 'Theology of Crisis-written not only with a first tians could agree with the description of its meaning.... hand k"nowledge of the literature of the Barthian school as a Buchmanism is crossless Christianity. It welcomes those who whole but with something like an appreciation of the issues in believe in a modernist as well as those who believe in an volved-was not available when Dr. ROLSTON wrote. Despite this orthodox interpretation of the cross." very serious limitation-a limitation that would perhaps have dis Dr. VAN TIL's indictment of Buchmanism contains nine mayed a less youthful writer-Dr. ROLSTON hail given us a book counts. "Summing up the whole matter," he writes, "we may that will be welcomed by many. If Dr. ROLSTON lacks the say that Buchmanism introduces (1) a fafse democracy in scholastic equipment of some of his predecessors, he is at least Christian evangelism, (2) a false psychology in preaching, (3 ) the superior of most of them as a literary artist_ While we do a false antithesis between life and doctrine, (4) a false antithesis not share Dr. ERNEST TRICE THOMPSON'S judgment, as expres~ed between piety and controversy, (5) church unionism [which in its introduction, to the effect that with the publication ,d!?; Dr. ignores even the distinction between the 'saved and the 'un ROLSTON'S book Barthianism "for the first time becomes': really saved'], (6) a false mysticism, (7) a false theory of sin, (8) a intelligible to average Americans" we fully approve when he false theory of the atonement, and (9) a false perfectionism." asserts that Dr. ROLSTON "writes with such ease and such clarity "It is because of these reasons," he adds, "that Buchmanism is that no one can fail to understand." Those who depend upon popular today. It has 'lure' but no 'logic'." this book alone will hardly obtain an adequate notion of the merits and demerits of Barthianism; but those who read it in Dr.

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