To that long line of classical Reformed theologians belongs Louis Berkhof (1853-1957), professor for almost forty years at Calvin Theological Seminary. His internationally renowned Systematic Theology is valued as a highly useful single-volume theology textbook. It has become a standard work both for training and for examining ministerial candidates among Reformed and Presbyterian denominations throughout the world.
Some today are saying publicly (and privately), wherever such a narrative may be useful, that “Louis Berkhof taught Two Kingdoms theology, too.”
Well, if what you read below defines that theology accurately, then there really exists no genuine debate. And the churches need not have been agitated by what has been presented as a “recovery” of something allegedly lost.
See what you think.
Since the Roman Catholics insist indiscriminately on the identification of the Kingdom of God and the Church, their Church claims power and jurisdiction over every domain of life, such as science and art, commerce and industry, as well as social and political organizations. This is an altogether mistaken conception. It is also a mistake to maintain, as some Reformed Christians do, in virtue of an erroneous conception of the Church as an organism, that Christian school societies, voluntary organizations of younger or older people for the study of Christian principles and their application in life, Christian labor unions, and Christian political organizations, are manifestations of the Church as an organism, for this again brings them under the domain of the visible Church and under the direct control of its officers. Naturally, this does not mean that the Church has no responsibility with respect to such organizations. It does mean, however, that they are manifestations of the Kingdom of God, in which groups of Christians seek to apply the principles of the Kingdom to every domain of life. The visible Church and the Kingdom, too, may be identified to a certain extent. The visible Church may certainly be said to belong to the Kingdom, to be a part of the Kingdom, and even to be the most important visible embodiment of the forces of the Kingdom. . . . In so far as the visible Church is instrumental in the establishment and extension of the Kingdom, it is, of course, subordinate to this as a means to an end. The Kingdom may be said to be a broader concept than the Church, because it aims at nothing less that the complete control of all the manifestations of life. It represents the dominion of God in every sphere of human endeavor.
From Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1941), pp. 569-570.
Berkhof’s point about the activity of the church as organism necessarily coming under the domain of the visible church is debatable.
Nevertheless, if this is what people mean when they claim that Louis Berkhof taught “Two Kingdoms theology,” then all could rejoice and be glad.
For the unwary reader, were the preceding sentence written in Greek, it would be a “contrary to fact condition,” of the sort: “If pigs had wings, then they could fly.”
What an awesome quote from Berkhof, thanks so much for sharing.
Thank you for posting this. As the old phrase goes, “He who defines, wins.”
Lines up nicely with Vos’ description of Christ’s kingdom, which clearly is not reduced to a cordoned- off ecclesiastical realm. The kingdom is manifested in other societal institutions that come under the redemptive rule of Christ. Hence, a Calvinist can speak of a. “Christian” family, school, or other voluntary association
And if folks are publicly claiming that Berkhof taught anything resembling R2k, {note we just saw Hart remarkably make that claim regarding Vos in the “disingenous” thread here} then I’ll repeat what I’ve said before: one must have the confessions in one hand and a Bible in the other when reading such claims.
A revisionist theological paradigm creates a revisionist linguistic paradigm where words no longer carry their historical meaning.
More indications that R2K has no historical legs
“The intimate connection between Lutheran theology and princely authority found legal expression, in the first instance, in new principles of constitutional law affecting both the religious and the secular spheres. In protestant principalities, as well as in free imperial cities that opted for Protestantism, prince and city magistrates enacted ordinances in the 1530’s and 1540’s closing Roman Catholic places of worship and ending or severely limiting traditional Roman Catholic practices such as fasting, penance, veneration of the saints, indulgences, masses for the dead, the giving of alms to mendicant friars, and numerous festivals and holidays. As Steven Ozment has noted, ’so literally and piously do these ordinances enshrine the doctrinal teaching of Protestants in law that the unobservant reader might thing he had stumbled upon evangelical sermons and pamphlets from the 1520’s.
Harold J. Berman
Law & Revolution – pg. 64
1.) Luther came up with two kingdom theology to replace the Roman Catholic Gelasian two sword theory. Luther’s two kingdom theology as it was implemented and practiced during the Reformation era looks nothing like the Radical two kingdom theology that its salesmen are trying to pass off as “traditional Reformed two kingdom theology.”
2.) Note that there was a intimate connection between Lutheran theology and princely authority. Can anyone who knows anything about R2K envision them approving of a intimate connection between any kind of Reformed theology and princely authority?
3.) Note that the new law that was made in formerly Roman Catholic principalities was what it was because of Lutheran theology. Lutheran two kingdom theology did not advocate for a pluralistic democratic social order. It was a Lutheran social order guided and inspired by Lutheran theology. How can R2K claim any affinity with historic two kingdom theology?
3.) Note that the magistrate, because of the new law that was driven by the new theology, closed down Roman Catholic houses of worship and legislated against Roman Catholic practices. R2K insists that the magistrate is required that all the gods be free to roam the public square. How does R2K have any historic continuity with Lutheran two kingdom theology as it originally impacted social order?
4.) The last sentence where Ozment is cited doesn’t even require comment.
R2K is nothing but innovation. It is made up whole cloth out of the minds of a few Escondido chaps.
“R2K (Radical Two Kingdom) … A Historical Analysis V”
“The Lutheran concept of the prince, rooted in the theological doctrine of vocation and office, was essentially different from that of Luther’s famous contemporary, Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527). Machiavelli also believed in a secular state, removed from divine law; in that respect he too can be said to have had a ‘two kingdoms’ theory. But Machiavelli’s prince was to act solely from considerations of power politics, whereas Luther’s prince was to strive also to do justice. Machiavelli’s prince was to foster religion as a means of keeping his people satisfied, united, and loyal. Luther’s prince was to be guided by religion in regulating relationships to one another. The German Lutherans of the sixteenth century did not accept the Machiavellian view that makes selfishness and struggle for power the basic principle of political actions. They were unwilling to abandon the earthly kingdom to its own Satanic devices. In this respect they continued the older Roman Catholic tradition, though from a different theological and philosophical perspective.
Harold J. Berman
Law & Revolution II – pg. 43
1.) From this quote we learn that there all ‘two kingdoms’ theories are not equal. Both Machiavelli and Luther advocated two kingdom theology but obviously Luther would have blanched at Machiavelli two kingdom social order theory. In the same way today, all Reformed folks who tout two kingdoms theology should not be immediately embraced simply because they call their theology two kingdom.
2.) Machiavelli’s two kingdom theology has this much in common with modern Radical two kingdom theology inasmuch both of these two kingdom theologies are willing to abandon the earthly kingdom (i.e. – common realm) to its own Satanic devices. Now, R2k advocates will deny this observation by insisting that they desire Christians to be leaven in the common realm but with their view that the Church can not speak to individual Christians as to what Christian leavening in the common realm looks like, what else are we to conclude but that the common realm is left to its own Satanic devices? Keep in mind that R2k does insist that Christians are to be Christian in the common realm, but at the same time insists that the Church must be silent when Christian being Christians in the common realm means that Christian orders and agencies are set up in order to endorse collectivism and redistribution in the name of Jesus (to give just one example). Radical two kingdom theology means chaos in a common realm that is ordered by the principles of multiculturalism and multi-faithism. Radical two kingdom theology in a multicultural society is a recipe for how to make the Church and Christianity marginalized and irrelevant.
3.) If Luther’s Prince in Luther’s “two kingdom theology” is to strive to do justice and if that Prince was to be guided by religion in regulating relationship then it is obvious that the Prince in question is being guided by Christianity. Luther rightly wanted to get the Church out from hegemony in the civil realm, but that did not mean that he desired to get rid of God from hegemony in the civil realm. In Luther’s two kingdom theology, the Prince, unlike the Gelasian two sword theory, was not to be dictated to by the Church though he was still answerable to God. In modern R2k theories the whole idea of a Christian prince has completely disappeared.
“Already here Berkhof showed the agility that would enable him alone to survive the tests of strife and time. Christ came to save souls and society, he argued; redemption applied to the physical as well as to the spiritual; the redeemed would find perfection only in eternity but had to apply their principles ‘in all spheres’ of this world. Berkhof displayed the full line of Kuyperian wares, condemning ‘Revolutionary individualism’ and Modernism, affirming the cultural mandate and the importance of principle. With one group of Neo-Calvinists he could call for a witness that improved the world; with the other, the necessity of separate organizations. AND WITH THE CONFESSIONALISTS HE DECLARED THAT KNOWLEDGE OF DOCTRINE WAS THE HIGHEST GOOD, PREACHING TO LOST SOULS WAS THE PRIMARY TASK, THE CIRCLE OF BELIEVERS WAS THE FIRST OBJECT OF CONCERN, AND DEEPENING OF PIETY WAS THE CRUX OF AMERICANIZATION.” – James Bratt, “Dutch Calvinism in Modern America – A History of a Conservative Subculture”, page 54.
CRC Pastor, this is rich. 2k is accused of being Lutheran and now we’re not Lutheran enough?
A little lesson for you here, no 2ker denies that the magisterial Reformation was a magisterial Reformation.
But if you want Erastianism, fine. So too did the Arminians in the Netherlands. (Which way will the Dutch go on that one?)
History “teacher”
Right … I do think that the charge of neo-Lutheranism was unfair — at least to historic Lutheranism. I think really, that y’all are more neo-anabaptist.
Glad to see you embracing the Magisterial Reformation as Magisterial and thus have no problems with those quotes I posted from Berman.
Touching the uber silly charge of Erastianism …
Well … that’s just silly History “teacher.” No Reformed person believes the State is over the Church. Classic Reformed Doctrine finds Church and State co-equals in their distinctive but interdependent spheres under Sovereign God.
Weren’t you taught this somewhere along the way?
CRC Pastor, I sure hope you think the Westminster Divines were “classic” when it comes to Reformed Doctrine. If so, you may be surprised to read a Caesaro-papist type construction in chapter 23:
“The civil magistrate may not assume to himself the administration of the Word and sacraments, or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven: yet he hath authority, and it is his duty, to take order, that unity and peace be preserved in the Church, that the truth of God be kept pure and entire; that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed; all corruptions and abuses in worship and discipline prevented or reformed; and all the ordinances of God duly settled, administered, and observed. For the better effecting whereof, he hath power to call synods, to be present at them, and to provide that whatsoever is transacted in them be according to the mind of God.”
Since I teach Western Heritage, I am struck by how much this resembles Constantine who also called and sat at a certain council — let’s see, that was Nicea.
And given your interests as a history buff, you may be intrigued to learn that it’s not fast-fading Reformed churches like the CRC but communions like the OPC where I worship and the PCA where NDK worships that eliminated this language from our confession of faith.
Is it radical to fail to acknowledge when history changes, or is it perverse stubbornness?
Perhaps you’re also aware we now live not in a monarchy but a republic.