WESTERN SEMINARY
OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE:
Summer Semester
June 28-
Gregg R. Allison, instructor
The development of key Christian doctrines throughout the history of the church. The focus of this particular course is the doctrine of Scripture.
When we pick up our Bible to read, study or preach, we do something that clergy and lay people, believers and unbelievers, sinners and saints have been doing for thousands of years. What can we learn from such an illustrious heritage about the doctrine of Scripture that can be of benefit to our life and ministry today?
For example, how did the Church come to consider the sixty-six books in our Bible to constitute the canon of Scripture? Why were such issues as the authority, necessity, sufficiency and clarity of Scripture worth dividing the Church into Catholic and Protestant? Has the Church historically believed in the inerrancy of the Bible? How have the ideas of revelation and inspiration undergone revision during the last century and what impact does this have on us? What is the origin and development of biblical criticism?
As a result of this course, you will solidify your doctrine of, and confidence in, Scripture in accordance with the perspective of the Church throughout its history. This well-honed belief will enable you to trust holy Scripture and thus sustain you and your ministry throughout the rest of your own history.
1. You will learn a diachronic methodology of historical theology that will enable you not only to research the history of the doctrine of Scripture, but the history of any Christian doctrine as well.
2. You will study some of the pivotal documents that contributed to the formation of the Church’s doctrine of Scripture throughout the centuries, and you will clearly articulate your own doctrine of Scripture.
3. You will gain an appreciation for how the sixty-six books of the (Protestant) Bible came to be considered canonical Scripture.
4. You will be challenged by the (often times) volatile debate between Catholics and Protestants over the doctrine of Scripture at the time of the Reformation, and you will investigate whether such issues as the authority, necessity, sufficiency, and perspicuity of Scripture were worth dividing the Church.
5. You will determine whether the doctrine of the inerrancy of Scripture as held by most “conservative” evangelicals has been the historical perspective of the Church or rather a fairly recent (and hence dubious) formulation.
6. You will investigate the shift that has occurred in the last century regarding the traditional doctrines of revelation and inspiration, and you will determine whether this revision is warranted or not and what impact it exerts on us today.
7. You will wrestle with the history of the origin and development of biblical criticism; this will enable you to appreciate the roots of the attacks against Scripture and will prepare you to offer appropriate rejoinders.
8. You will explore the history of the interpretation of Scripture and confront the latest challenges to the traditional evangelical hermeneutic (a literal, or grammatical- historical method) in the form of the postmodernist “incredulity towards meaning” and “suspicion of hermeneutics.”
9. Throughout all this, you will be encouraged to embrace the historical position of the Church on the doctrine of Scripture wherever and whenever that position has been in accordance with Scripture itself, with the desired outcome being that you will gain greater trust and confidence in the revealed, inspired, canonical Word of God that is authoritative, necessary, sufficient, perspicuous, true and efficacious.
10. You will further your research and writing skills.
1. Scripture in the Early Church and the Formation of the Canon
2. Medieval and Scholastic Exegesis
3. Reformation Issues
4. The Origin and Development of Biblical Criticism
5. The Truthfulness, or Inerrancy, of Scripture
6. The Doctrine of Revelation
7. The Inspiration of Scripture
8. The Authority of Scripture
1. Regular attendance at, and participation, in class lecture and discussions:
2. Thorough reading of the following:
see Reading Assignments handout
3. Research assignment:
In consultation with the instructor, students will write a research paper on one of the topics in the doctrine of Scripture. This paper should be ten to twelve pages (double spaced) and reflect careful interaction with the best articles and books on the topic chosen.
4. Expanded doctrinal statement on Scripture:
At the conclusion of the course and in lieu of a final exam, students will submit a carefully written paper (approximately five pages, double spaced) setting forth their doctrinal convictions on the canonicity, inspiration, authority, truthfulness/inerrancy, sufficiency, necessity, clarity, and interpretation of Scripture. The form for this assignment may be either an expansion of the doctrinal statements currently written in the theology classes of this institution, or it may be along the lines of the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy with articles of both affirmation and denial.
Course Grading:
Research assignment 40%
Expanded doctrinal statement 20%
Late
Assignments:
Assignments turned in late will be lowered 1/2 of
a grade (e.g. A to A-) for each two day period they are turned in after the
assigned date.
Absence Policy:
If you are not able to attend a class session,
you should make arrangements to get the notes from a colleague (your instructor
will not give out copies of his lecture notes).
You may make arrangements in advance with a colleague to tape a session
you know you will miss, but that tape is for your private use only.
Your instructor will grant extensions on papers
only in the case of a true emergency (serious sickness, death of a family member,
etc.). Do not expect to be given a
reprieve for unexcused "emergencies.
Questions Concerning This Course:
Before asking your instructor a question about
this course, please carefully consult this syllabus to see if that question has
already been answered.
1. SCRIPTURE IN THE
EARLY CHURCH AND THE FORMATION OF THE CANON
John D. Hannah, “The Doctrine of Scripture in the Early Church,” in Inerrancy and the Church, John D. Hannah, ed., 3-35.
David G. Dunbar, “The Biblical Canon,” in Hermeneutics, Authority, and Canon,
D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge, eds., 299-360.
Gregg R. Allison, “The Canon of Scripture,” in An Introduction to Historical and Philosophical Theology (rough draft), 2-26.
James J. Megivern, ed., Official Catholic Teachings: Bible Interpretation
“The Muratorian Fragment",” 1-3
Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History (Book 3, ch. 25), 27-28
Athanasius, “Letter 39,” 36-38
Council of Hippo, Canon 36, 48
2. MEDIEVAL AND
SCHOLASTIC EXEGESIS
Origen, On First Principles (Book 4, chs. 2 and 3), in The Classics of Western Spirituality: Origen, 171-205.
Robert M. Grant, A Short History of the Interpretation of the Bible, 39-91.
Steven Ozment, “What Scripture Means: The Interpretation of the Bible in the Middle Ages,” in The Age of Reform: 1250-1550, 63-72.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, Part 1, Question 1, Article 10
3. REFORMATION ISSUES
Heiko A. Oberman, “Quo Vadis, Petre?”, in The Dawn of the Reformation, 269-289.
Martin Luther, To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation, in Luther’s Works, vol. 44, James Atkinson, ed., 126-127 (introduction), 133-136 (the “second wall”).
Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will, Packer and Johnston, trans., 70-74, 123-134.
Council of
Gregg R. Allison, “The Clarity of Scripture,” in An Introduction to Historical and Philosophical Theology (rough draft).
J. Theodore Mueller, “Luther and the Bible,” in Inspiration and Interpretation, John F. Walvoord, ed., 87-114,
Kenneth S. Kantzer, “Calvin and the Holy Scriptures,” in Inspiration and Interpretation, John F. Walvoord, ed., 115-155.
4. BIBLICAL CRITICISM
Edgar Krenz, “The Rise of Historical Criticism,” in The Historical-Critical Method, 6-32.
5. THE TRUTHFULNESS,
or INERRANCY, OF SCRIPTURE
Paul D. Feinberg, “The Meaning of Inerrancy,” in Inerrancy, Norman Geisler, ed., 267-304.
Robert D. Preus, “Luther and Biblical Infallibility,” in Inerrancy and the Church, John D. Hannah, ed., 99-142.
J. I. Packer, “John Calvin and the Inerrancy of Holy Scripture,” in Inerrancy and the Church, John D. Hannah, ed., 143-188.
W. Robert Godfrey, “Biblical Authority in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries: A Question of Transition,” in Scripture and Truth, D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge, eds., 225-243.
John D. Woodbridge, “Some Misconceptions on the Impact of the ‘Enlightenment’ on the Doctrine of Scripture, in Hermeneutics, Authority, and Canon, D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge, eds., 241-270.
John D. Woodbridge and Randall H. Balmer, “The Princetonians and Biblical Authority: An Assessment of the Ernest Sandeen Proposal,” in Scripture and Truth, D. A. Carson and John D. Woodbridge, eds., 251-279.
John D. Woodbridge, Biblical Authority, 13-151.
Nigel M. de S. Cameron, “Incarnation and Inscripturation: The Christological Analogy in the Light of Recent Discussion,” in The Scottish Bulletin of Evangelical Theology, vol. 3, no. 2 (1985): 35-46.
6. REVELATION
John Baille, The Idea of Revelation in Recent Thought, 19-40.
7. THE INSPIRATION OF
SCRIPTURE
B. B. Warfield, “The Church Doctrine of Inspiration” and “The Biblical Idea of Inspiration,” in The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, 105-128, 131-166.
8. THE AUTHORITY OF
SCRIPTURE
Nigel M. de S. Cameron, “The Logic of Biblical Authority,” in The Challenge of Evangelical Theology, 1-16.
David H. Kelsey, The Uses of Scripture in Recent Theology, 1-112.