The church is always situated in a cultural context. Ever since the early church, Christians have grappled with how to speak the gospel into culture and become all things to all people while remaining true to biblical teachings.
And yet contemporary Western societies have largely lost their meaningful engagement with, and connection to, history. This has left them disconnected from the full scope of the cultural context of the church. I have coined the term “Ahistoric Age” to identify the way in which this plays out.
There are five major characteristics of the Ahistoric Age:
1. We believe that the past is merely a source of shame and oppression from which we must free ourselves.
2. We no longer think of ourselves as part of historical communities.
3. We’re increasingly ignorant of history.
4. We don’t believe history has a narrative or a purpose.
5. We’re unable to reason well and disagree peaceably about the ethical complexities of the past—the coexistence of good and evil in the same historical figure or episode.
When I discuss the effects of ahistoricism in the church, I’m not suggesting we need to reject contemporary culture completely and simply reembrace everything we did in the past, as if the past were somehow by definition superior. Rather, I’m alerting us to some ways ahistoric attitudes are affecting the church so we can be aware of what’s going on and better equipped to engage with those issues.
Attitudes of Ahistoricism
Ahistoricism is by no means everywhere in the church. But where ahistoricism is present, it manifests itself in three broad attitudes towards the past: irrelevance, ignorance, and ideology.
First, irrelevance posits that the way we did things in the past is simply not relevant to us anymore. We don’t think of history or our traditions as a guide or helpful resource for us.
Second, people are increasingly ignorant of history in general, as well as of Christianity’s history, teachings, and practices. Do we know the role Christianity has played in the founding ideas of our societies? Do we know how our core doctrinal beliefs and traditions developed, and are we aware of what they could offer us?
Do we know how our core doctrinal beliefs and traditions developed, and are we aware of what they could offer us?
And, finally, ideology is when we approach the past with an ideological attitude and framework, which we then use to judge the past.
These three attitudes often overlap and influence one another and have multiple outworkings we can observe, but I’d like to focus on one in particular: a doctrinal drift from orthodoxy.
Ahistoricism’s Effect on Doctrine
By this, I mean the attempt to redefine or dispense with historic teachings and doctrines of the faith. Two attitudes underlie this attempt: an attitude of irrelevance and an ideological attitude that dismisses the historic teaching or approach as ignorant, oppressive, or prejudiced.
There is an idea that the church ought to reinterpret, or has always reinterpreted, doctrine to suit the times, especially to reverse long-established teachings, is overly simplistic, theologically impoverished, and historically inaccurate. There are some issues on which large numbers of Christians have developed their biblical interpretations over the centuries, but these aren’t cases of completely revising key doctrines to produce a position entirely at odds with the history of biblical interpretation. Nor are these instances of simply discarding the history of theology in light of new information or experience.
When Martin Luther wrote his Ninety-five Theses, for example, he was advocating a return to a biblical understanding of salvation held by the early church from which the late medieval church erred in its fairly recent institution of indulgences and overemphasis on a causal relationship between penance and justification. The church’s understanding of slavery is another example, in which many abolitionists not only sought to recover a biblical understanding but also had precedent throughout history of Christians opposing slavery and actively buying the freedom of slaves.
Moreover, for centuries, Christians have been engaged in discussions about certain issues on which they continue to hold a variety of positions, such as the just war tradition and capital punishment. These, however, aren’t hills to die on, to use Gavin Ortlund’s helpful metaphor. In short, there can be different opinions on these issues within orthodox Christianity. But how might we determine which issues are hills to die on and which issues can support multiple orthodox positions?
It’s enormously helpful to know how the history of doctrine and orthodoxy has developed over the centuries, as this can be an excellent resource to help us think through and discuss issues. It can also help us see which hills are worth dying on. G. K. Chesterton’s famous fence analogy is helpful here.
Chesterton wrote that when we approach a fence or a gate erected across a road, a reckless person may say, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” However, a more intelligent person would know that the “gate or fence did not grow there. . . . Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable.”
Likewise, when we approach the historic, orthodox doctrines of the church, an ahistoric approach will often say, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” If we know our history, however, we can see how people came to that biblical interpretation. The doctrines held in the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed are examples of “fences” built around Christian orthodoxy. We must know their history so we don’t recklessly tear these fences down.
Doctrine Rooted in History, Not Cultural Whims
Biblical interpretation is a complex and weighty process. Arguing that ahistoricism partially underpins attempts to redefine key Christian doctrines today by no means implies the authority of historical teachings over the Bible or that Christians never reinterpret Scripture passages.
The doctrines held in the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed are examples of ‘fences’ built around Christian orthodoxy. We must know their history so we don’t recklessly tear them down.
When Protestants grapple with an issue of interpretation, the ultimate source of authority is the Bible. However, having the history of biblical scholarship is also beneficial, particularly on doctrinal matters.
Consequently, we ought to be suspicious of those who dismiss two millennia of theological teaching on doctrinal matters like Christ’s divinity as irrelevant. Historical grounding can provide a handbrake on rapid and profound doctrinal changes that undermine orthodoxy and sweep churches along the currents of culture.
We find a profound ahistoric attitude when we look at what lies at the heart of doctrinal drift in churches, especially on many contemporary issues. One of ahistoricism’s primary outworkings in the church is the claim that centuries of teaching on key issues of doctrine or Christian ethics can simply be dismissed because they’re now deemed irrelevant; the past is just “outdated dogma,” to use Spong’s term.
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