-- D. Value of general revelation.
a church. For religion is something essentially different from science; it has a different source and basis. The eighteenth century could find pleasure in such truths of reason and vain abstractions. The nineteenth century with its historical sense soon realized that such a religio naturalis did not and cannot exist anywhere. It is now generally agreed that all religions are positive and based on revelation, Schleiermacher, Glaub. § 10 Zusatz. Ritschl, Rechtf. u.
Vers, III2 4, 500. ld. ünterricht in der christl. Religion3 S. 20. Frank, System der chr. Wahrheit. I2 512 f. Doedes, Encyclopaedie 190,191.
W. Bender, Zur Geschichte der Emancipation dér natürl. Theol., Jahrb. f. prot. Theol. 1883 S. 529-592. R. Rütschi, Die Lehre von der natürlichen Religion u. vom Naturrecht, Jahrb. 1. prot. Theol. 1884
S. 1-48. Hoekstra, Wijsg. Godsd. I 19 v.
D. Value of general revelation.
8. With this, however, general revelation has not lost its value and significance. First of all, it has great significance for the heathen world. It is the solid and lasting basis of pagan religions. The Holy
Scriptures pronounce a severe judgment on Ethnicism and explain its origin by the apostasy from the pure knowledge of God. This knowledge, which was originally the property of man, continued to have an effect for a time, Gen. 4:3. 8:20, and the creation revealed
God's eternal power and divinity, Rom. 1:20. But mankind, bewildered in his thoughts and darkened in his heart, has not glorified or thanked God, knowing Him as God. In addition, the confusion of speech and the dispersion of the people of Gen. 11 certainly had a great influence on the development of polytheism,
Orig. c. Cels V. Aug. de civ. Dei 16 : 6. Schelling, Einleitung in die philos. der Mythologie I 94 f. Delitzsch, Comm, on Gen. 11. Auberlen,
The divine revelation I 187 f. Fabri, Die Entstehung des Heidenthums und die Aufgabe der Heidenmission 1859. Herzog2 12
: 108. The Hebr. גוי, the crowd, nation, connected by descent and language, next to עם the people connected by unity of government also points to this. The word has a national and at the same time an ethical-religious meaning, just like lat. pagani and us pagans. The
unity of God and thus the purity of religion was lost in the division of mankind into peoples. Each people got its own, national god. And once the notion of the unity and absoluteness of God was lost, other powers besides that one national god could gradually be recognised and worshipped as gods; the idea of the divine became impure and declining; the various natural powers came to the fore and increased in importance; the boundary between the divine and the creaturely was erased; and religion could even degenerate into animism and feticism, into witchcraft and magic. According to Scripture, the character of pagan religions is idolatry. The heathen gods are idols, they do not exist, they are lies and vanity Isa. 41:29, 42:17, 46: 1 v.
Jer. 2: 28. Ps. 106 : 28. Acts 14 : 15 , 19 : 26. Gal. 4:8. 1 Cor. 8 : 5. In those religions even a daemonic power operates Deut. 82 : 17. Ps. 106
: 28. 1 Cor. 10 : 20 v. Apoc. 9 : 20. The condition of the heathen world outside of the revelation to Israel, outside of Christ, is described as darkness Isa. 9:1, 60:2. Luk. 1:79. Joh. 1:5. Ei. 4:18, as storminess Hd. 17:30. 1 Petr 1:14. Rom 1 : 18 v.; as imagined vain wisdom 1 Cor. 1: 18 v., 2:6, 3:19 v.; as sin and iniquity Rom 1:24 v.,
3:9 v.
The pagan world, in its origin, character, and destiny, is a daunting problem. In itself the solution which Scripture gives to it is not only not absurd, but it even commends itself by its simplicity and its naturalness. Yet philosophy, both historical and religious, has not been satisfied with that solution and has proposed another view which is diametrically opposed to that of Scripture. It is true that the exaltation of the childlike condition of the people, as it was customary in the last century, no longer meets with approval. But the theory of evolution, which now serves as an explanation, is equally at variance with Scripture. Just as natural science seeks to deduce the living from the inanimate, the organic from the inorganic, man from animal, the conscious from the unconscious, the superior from the inferior, so the religious science of the new age seeks to explain religion from an earlier religiousless state and pure religion from the primitive forms of feticism, animism, etc. D. Hume has already begun this in his Natural history of religion. With Hegel it fitted
completely into the framework of his pantheistic philosophy, Vorlesungen iïber die Philosophie der Religion 1832. And since then it has found more and more dissemination and defence, Buckle,
History of civilization in England 1858. AV. E. H. Lecky, History of the rise and influence of the spirit of rationalism in Europe 1865. E
B. Tylor, Researches into the early history of mankind and the development of civilization 2d ed. 1870. Id. Primitive Culture 1872.
Sir John Lubbock, Prehistoric times as illustrated by ancient remains and the manners and customs of modern savages 1865. Id. The origin of civilization and the primitive condition of man 1870. H.
Spencer, The principles of sociology 1876-'82. E. von Hellwald, Kulturgeschichte in ihrer natiirlichen Entwicklung bis zur
Gegenwart, 3e Aufl. 1883. 0. Caspari, Die Urgeschichte der Menschheit mit Riicksicht auf die natürliche Entwicklung des frhhesten Geisteslebens 1873. G. Roskoff, Das Religionswesen der rohesten Natttrvolker 1880.
Ed. von Hartmann, Religionsphilosophie, Leipzig. 0. Pfleiderer, Religionsphilos. auf geschichtl. Grundlage, 2e Aufl. 1883-84. H. Siebeck, Lehrb. der
Religionsphilosophie 1893. A. Reville, Prolégomènes de 1'histoire des religions, Paris 1881. C. P. Tiele, The place v. d. godsd. of natural peoples in the history of religion 1873. Id. On the laws of the development of religion, Theol. Tijdschr. 1874. ld. Gesch. v. d. godsd.
1876 etc. However generally accepted this doctrine of evolution may be, in any case it does not yet have a higher rank than that of a hypothesis. But it does not explain the phenomena. In natural science it still comes up against the facts of life, consciousness, speech, language, will, etc. And in religious science the origin and essence, the truth and value of religion continue to be protested against. That the nature peoples represent the original state of mankind, that feticism and animism are the oldest forms of religion, and that the first men were equal to children or savages, are opinions that lack sufficient foundation and therefore meet with more and more contradiction. Schelling, in his Philosophie der Mythologie und
Offenbarung, accepted a relative monotheism as original. Max Muller recognizes a so-called henotheism as a primitive religion,
Vorlesungen iiber Ursprung und Entwicklung der Religion S. 292 f.
Deutsche Rundschau Sept. 1878. Cf. Rauwenhoff, Wijsb. v. d. godsd.
95 v. 191 v. and Hoekstra, Wijsg. Godsd. 146 v. Also the opinion, that the different religions are successive moments in one process of development, is much less probable than the one, which she holds for degenerations of one kind, Kahler, Wiss, der chr. Lehre I 185. The doctrine of Scripture on the origin and the essence of Ethnicism is therefore still more or less definitely defended by Lüken, Die Einheit des Menschengeschlechts und dessen Ausbreitung über die ganze
Erde 1845. Doedes, The application of the theory of development not to be recommended for the gesch. der godsd. 1874.
E. L. Fischer, Heidenthum und Offenbarung 1878. Zöckler, Die Lehre vom Urstand des Menschen, Gutersloh 1879. Id. Art. Polytheismus in Herzog2. Lenormant, Les origines de l'histoire d'après la Bible et les traditions des peuples orientaux, 3 vols. 1880-84. Diestel, der
Monoth. des Heidenthums, Jahrb. f. deutsche Theol. 1860 s. 669759. A. Tholuck, Der sittliche Charakter des Heidenthums 3® Aufl.,
Werke VIII 1865 s. 1 - 91. J. N. Sepp, Das Heidenthum und dessen Bedeutung für das Christenthum, 3 Theile Regensburg 1853. C.
Pesch, Gott und Götter.
Eine Studie zur vergleichenden Religionswissenschaft.
Freiburg 1890.
Formby-Krieg, Der Monothelsmus der Offenbarung und das Heidenthum. Mainz 1880.
Ebrard, Apologetik, 2nd Aufl. Gütersloh 1878-80. II 521 f.
Vigouroux, La Bible et les découvertes modernes en Palestine, en Egypt et en Assyrie, 4 vols. James Orr, The Christian view of God and the world, Edinburgh, Elliot 1893 p. 141, 193, 431, 466, 501. S. H.
Kellogg, The genesis and growth of religion, New-York and London 1892. Cf. Ch. de la Saussaye, Lehrb. der Rel. gesch. S. 7 f. 23 f.
9. But, however strictly the Scriptures may judge the character of paganism, the very general revelation which they teach enables and entitles us to recognize all the elements of truth which are also present in pagan religions. The study of religions used to be exclusively in the service of dogmatics and apologetics. The founders of religions, like Muhammed, were simply held to be impostors, enemies of God, accomplices of the devil. Cf. Dr. Snouck Hurgronje,
De Islam. Gids 1886 II 239 v. But since those religions have become more accurately known, this explanation has turned out to be untenable; it was in conflict with both history and psychology.
According to the Holy Scriptures there is also among the heathen a revelation of God, an illumination of the Logos, an operation of God's
Spirit, Gen. 6:17, 7:15. Ps. 33:6, 104:30, 139 vs. 2. Job 32:8. Eccles.
3:19. Spr. 8:22 v. Mal. 1:11, 14. John 1:9. Rom. 2 : 14. Gal. 4 : 1-3. Acts 14 : 16, 17; 17 v. 22-30. Many church fathers, Just. Martyr, Apol. 1:47,
Clemens Alex. Strom. I 7 e. a. assumed an activity of the Logos in the pagan world. Augustine speaks several times very unfavourably of the pagans, but yet also recognizes that they saw the truth in shadow, de civ. 19.1 de trin. 4.20, that the truth was not completely hidden to them, de civ. 8:11 f. and that we therefore must do our profit with the truth in pagan philosophy and must appropriate it, de doctr. chr.
2.60. Non usque adeo in anima humana imago Dei terrenorum affectuum labe detrita est, ut nulla in ea vel ut lineamenta extrema remanserint, unde merito dici possit, etiam in ipsa impietate vitae suae facere aliqua legis vel sapere, de spir. et. litt. c. 27.28. Also many non-reines acknowledge much truth, Retract. I c. 4. Thomas not only says , that mankind as a reasonable being, without supernatural grace, can know the veritates naturales, S. Theol. I 2 qu. 109 art. 1, but also testifies II 2 qu. 172 art. 6, that it is impossible esse aliquam cognitionem quae totaliter sit falsa, absque admixtione alicujus veritatis, and in doing so invokes the words of Beda and Augustine: nulla falsa est doctrina, quae non aliquando aliqua vera falsis intermisceat. The Reformed were even better off by their doctrine of gratia communis. This protected them on the one hand from the error of Pelagianism, which taught the sufficientia of the theol. naturalis and linked salvation to the maintenance of the lex naturae; but on the other hand it enabled them to recognize all the true and beautiful and good things that were also present in the pagan world.
Science, art, moral, domestic, social life, etc. were derived from that gratia communis and recognized and praised with gratitude, Calv.
Inst. II, 2. § 12 v. II 3. § 3 v. Zanchius, Opera VIII 646 sq.
Wttewrongel, Christ. Household I 288-299. Witsius, Oec. foed. III 12. § 52. ld. Twist of the Lord with his vineyard cap. 19. turret. Theol.
El. 10:5. Vossius, Hist. Pelag. 3:3. Pfanner, Systema Theol. Gentilis cap. 22 § 33. Trigland, Antapologia cap. 17. Moor, Comm, in Marckii
Comp. IV 826-829. Cf. my speech on The General Grace, Kampen 1894. Usually this working of the gratia communis was seen in the moral and intellectual, social and political life, but less often in the religions. Then only some religio naturalis, insita and acquisita were mentioned, but the connection between these and the religions was not demonstrated. The religions were derived from deception or daemonic influences. But not only in science and art, in morals and law, but also in religions, there is an operation of God's Spirit and of His general grace. Calvin rightly spoke of a semen religionis, a sensus divinitatis, Inst. I, 3, 1-3. I, 4, 1. II, 2, 18. For the founders of religion were not deceivers and not the instruments of Satan, but men of religious training who had a vocation for their time and for their people, and who exercised a favorable influence on the lives of the nations. The various religions, however much they may have been mixed up in error, have, to a certain extent, satisfied religious needs and brought comfort in the sorrows of life. Not only cries of despair, but also tones of confidence, hope, resignation, peace, submission, patience, etc., come to us from the pagan world. All the elements and forms that are essential to religion, the concept of God, guilt, the need for salvation, sacrifice, priesthood, temple, worship, prayer, etc., are corrupted but nevertheless appear in pagan religions. Even unconscious prophecies and striking expectations of a better and purer religion are not lacking here and there. Therefore Christianity is not only antithetical to paganism; it is also its fulfillment.
Christianity is the true but therefore also the highest and purest religion; it is the truth of all religions. What in Ethnicism is caricature, here is the living original. What is semblance there is being here. What is sought there is found here. Christianity is the explanation of Ethnicism. Christ is the Promised One of Israel and the Wish of all the Gentiles. Israel and the church are elected for the benefit of mankind. In Abraham's seed all the generations of the earth are blessed. Apart from the above-mentioned works by Fabri,
Sepp, Tholuck and others, see also Clemens Alex. Strom. 1, 1. 4, 5. 6, 8. Coh. ad gentes § 6. Orig. c. Cels. 4, 4. Ritschl, Rechtf. u. Vers. Ill2
184. Philippi, Kirchl. Gl. I 2. Beck, Einleitung in das Syst. der christl.
Lehre 2nd Aufl. 1870 S. 45 f. Saussaye in mine Theol. by Prof. Dr. Ch. d. 1. S. bl. 31 v. 46 v. 83 v. V. von Strauss und Torney, Das unbewust
Weissagende im vorchristl. Heidenthum (Zeitfr. des christl. Volkslebens VIII). "Staudenmaier, Encycl. der theol. Wiss. 1835 § 428 f.
Nitzsch, Lehrb. der ev. Dogm. 134 f. Kuyper, Encycl. Ill 445 v. 563 v.
10. But the revelatio generalis has significance not only for the pagan world, but also still in and for the Christian religion. Its value, however, does not lie in the fact that it provides us with a theologia or religio naturalis, a moralistic Vernunftglauben, which in itself would be sufficient and could do without all that is positive in religion. Such a religio naturalis is not found anywhere and is also not possible. Nor is it the intention of the revelatio generalis that the Christian should draw from it his first knowledge of God, the world and mankind, in order to supplement it later with the knowledge of Christ. Ritschl and his followers present it as if the dogmatist in the loei de Deo and de homine would take the material only from the revelatio generalis, and then draw the dot for the next loei first from the Holy Scriptures. The dogmatist would then first stand outside and in front of the Christian faith, and then with the later dogmata take his position in that faith, Ritschl, Rechtf. u. Vers. III2 4. But this has not been the method of Reformation dogmatics at least in the beginning. When the Christian professes his faith in God the Father, the Almighty, Creator of the heavens and the earth, then that is
Christian faith in the full sense. And the dogmatist does not first divest himself of this faith in order to formulate a reasonable doctrine about God and man from general revelation and to supplement it later with the revelation in Christ. But he draws his knowledge solely from the revelatio specialis, i.e. from the Holy
Scriptures. This is his principium unicum. But he does not limit this special revelation to the person of Christ, as is found in some parts of Scripture, e.g., in the Synoptics. Gospels or only in the Sermon on the Mount. The entire Revelation, which is summarized in Scripture, is a revelatio specialis, which comes to us in Christ. Christ is the center and content of all that special revelation, which begins in
Paradise and is completed in the Apocalypse. The special revelation has now recognized and appreciated the general one, and has even taken it over and assimilated it, as it were. And so does the Christian, so does the dogmatist. He stands in the Christian faith, in the revelatio specialis and sees nature and history from there. And now he discovers traces there of the same God, whom he got to know as his Father in Christ. Precisely as a Christian, through faith, he sees the revelation of God in nature much better and more clearly than he was able to perceive it before. Psychic man does not understand the word of God in nature and in history. He searches the entire universe without finding God. But the Christian, armed with the spectacles of the Holy Scriptures, R. de Sabunde, Theol. Natur. in den Prologus,
Calvin, Inst. I 6, 1, 16 sees God in everything and everything in God.
That is why we find in Scripture a poetry of nature and a view of history, such as is found nowhere else. With his Christian confession, the believer thus also finds himself in the world; he is no stranger to it, and sees no other power reigning there than the one he calls upon in Christ as his Father. By that general revelation he feels at home in the world; it is God's fatherly hand, from which all things in the natural also belong to him.
In that general revelation he also has a solid ground on which he can meet all non-Christians. He has the same basis in common with them. Because of his Christian faith he may occupy an isolated position, he may not be able to prove his beliefs to others; in the General Revelation he nevertheless has a point of contact with all those who bear the name of man. Just as the classical propaedeutic lays a common foundation for all men of science, so the general revelation holds all people together despite all religious differences.
Subjectively, for the believer, God's knowledge from nature is superior to that from Scripture. We are all born into a certain positive religion. Only the eye of faith sees God in creation; again, only the pure in heart see God. But objectively nature precedes grace, the revelatio generalis precedes the revelatio specialis. Gratia praesupponit naturam. The denial that the religio and theologia naturalis are sufficient and have an independent existence of their
own, does not diminish the fact that from creation, from nature and history, from the heart and conscience, there comes a word of God to every human being. No one can escape the power of the revelatio generalis. Religion belongs to the essence of mankind. The idea and existence of God, the spiritual independence and eternal destiny of man, the origin and purpose of the world, the moral world order and its ultimate triumph are problems which leave no room for rest in the human mind. The metaphysical desire cannot be suppressed.
Philosophy always seeks to satisfy it. It is the revelatio generalis which keeps this need alive. It prevents man from becoming an animal. It binds him to the supernatural world. It maintains in him the awareness that he is created in God's image and finds no rest except in God. The revelatio generalis preserves humanity until and unless it is found and restored by Christ. In this sense the theologia naturalis was rightly called a praeambula fidei, a divine preparation and education for Christianity. The general revelation is the basis on which the particular one rises.
And finally, the rich significance of general revelation is expressed in the fact that it keeps nature and grace, creation and transformation, the world of reality and the world of truth, in indissoluble connection with one another. Without the General Revelation, the particular revelation loses its coherence with the whole of cosmic being and life.
Then the link between the kingdom of nature and the kingdom of heaven is missing. Anyone who denies the revelatio generalis through critical philosophy makes a futile effort to regain what he has lost through practical imagination or phantasy. He has lost the support for his faith. Religious life stands apart from ordinary human existence; the image of God becomes a donum superadditum; religion becomes, as with the Socinians, alien to human nature;
Christianity becomes a sectarian phenomenon and is robbed of its catholicity; grace is hostile to nature. It is then consistent to assume, together with the ethical moderns, a radical separation between the power of good and the power of nature. Ethos and physis are totally separated. The world of Wirklichkeit and that of Werthe have nothing to do with each other. In principle, Parsism, Manichaeism is
renewed. On the other hand, the revelatio generalis maintains the unity of nature and grace, of the world and kingdom of God, of the natural and moral order, of creation and re-creation, of physis and ethos, of virtue and happiness, of holiness and salvation, and in all this the unity of the divine Being. It is one and the same God, who in general revelation leaves himself untouched to anyone and who in special revelation makes himself known as a God of grace. Thus, general and special revelation affect each other. Praemisit Deus naturam magisstreetcar, submissurus et prophetiam, quo facilius credas prophetiae discipulus naturae (Tertullian). Natura praecedit gratiam, gratia perficit naturam. Ratio perficitur a fide, tides supponit natural". Cf. Hofstede de Groot, Institutio theol. nat. ed. 4.
1861. Scholten, Leer der Herv. Kerk, 4th dr. I bl. 270 v. Kuyper, Nat.
Godknowledge, From the Word III. Voigt, Fund. dogm. 172 f.