The concept of classical theism has come up a few times on this blog, particularly in reference to discussion about whether desire is sin, does God the Son submit to the Father and does God have emotions? I tend to refer to recent attempts to promote a so called classical theism as “neo-classical theism” and here is one reason why.
We might think of classical theism as being simply the recognition of key doctrinal statements concerning God including the creedal statements on the Trinity and especially that God is Eternal, Infinite, Independent (Ase), unchanging (immutable) and not subject to emotions/passions (impassible). I affirm all of these. However, neo classical theism goes further and insists that we must stick with the same language and formulations from those considered to represent this classical view of God including the church fathers (especially Augustine and Athanasius) and Aquinas. It is argued that the Reformers including Calvin did too. It is then suggested, explicitly or implicitly that to vary from such formulations is to risk error and even heresy.
I think there is a crucial problem here. Whilst the doctrines I’ve highlighted above are there in Scripture, the formulations and developments currently being debated are not just rooted in Scripture but are rooted in the culture, language and philosophy of the day. In particular, what we see at times is a recovering of specific Greek philosophy at different times, sometimes Plato but also, notably Aristotle. In other words, the language and reasoning reflects a particular worldview shaped by Greek philosophy. It’s that worldview which not only thought of God in such a way but also was suspicious of emotions, saw God as distant, impersonal and unknowable and placed a high value on “spirit” rather than matter.
This not only affected views of the divine but also how the rest of creation and how humanity was viewed. So, you can see how forms of such a worldview led into Gnosticism with matter/creation seen as bad and something to escape from. You can also see how Roman Catholic Theology imported such a worldview leading to an anthropology which distinguished the higher self and spirit life from the lower self, seen as base.
There are, I think, three implications from this. First, we might want to consider the extent to which such a worldview does or doesn’t align with God’s Word. Second, we will want to consider how much the worldview affects understandings of God and how helpoful that is. Third, we might want to be cautious about presuming we have understood classical theists correctly if we read them from within our own worldview. Fourth, this should once again caution us from being quick to accuse others because they do not use the language and processing approaches of classical theism.
Faithroots 