It would be difficult to overstate the significance of Germany on 19th century American theology, and Annette Aubert (PhD in Historical Theology from Westminster Theological Seminary) has given us a wonderful accounting of it in her The German Roots of Nineteenth-Century American Theology. She begins broad and then focuses on the contrasting atonement theories of Charles Hodge of Old Princeton and Emanuel Vogel Gerhart of the German Reformed Church. It’s an insightful contribution to this extremely important and formative period of American theological history, and today she talks to us about her work.
Books At a Glance (Fred Zaspel):
Let’s begin with a broad characterization of the old German liberalism
Aubert:
One key feature of classical liberalism was its agenda for reconstructing the Christian faith in the context of Enlightenment culture and modern science. Liberalism incorporated new ideas from novel scientific and philosophical approaches to explain the Christian faith for the modern age. In view of the Enlightenment’s emphasis on individual freedom and reason, theologians began to question and reformulate traditional Christian doctrines, and a scientific approach and human consciousness became dominant in articulating Christian ideas. This liberalism proposed a Christology that described Jesus as an ethical archetype or moral exemplar; therefore greater emphasis was given to his person rather than his work. Further, as theologians accepted the views, findings, and methods of historical critical research, the Bible started to be studied like any other text in the contexts of contemporary Weltanschauung and historical scholarship. Last, it is commonly known that German liberalism, alongside modern philosophy, underscored human reason and God’s immanence.
Books At a Glance:
What were the context and influences that gave rise to liberalism?
Aubert:
To understand the rise of liberalism, one must be familiar with some of the broad social, philosophical, intellectual, and scientific contours of eighteenth-century Europe, particularly the French Revolution, Enlightenment philosophy, Romanticism, Pietism, and German universities. For our discussion I want to emphasize some of the influences of German Enlightenment philosophy and the German university system that gave rise to biblical criticism. I especially want to point out the importance of acknowledging that the rise of liberalism was influenced by the ideas of philosophers and thinkers like Immanuel Kant, and was informed by modern critical historiography. A new and subjective theological method was established through changes in philosophy introduced by Kant and Georg F. W. Hegel, which ushered in novel theological methods.
The ways in which the new Enlightenment philosophy was received marked a turning point for biblical studies at German universities. At the time it was commonly believed that without the study of philosophy and linguistics, there could be no scientific theological education. In my book German Roots of Nineteenth-Century American Theology I mention the work of Johann Semler (1725–91), a professor at the University of Halle, who proposed a study of the Bible in the spirit of historical criticism without dogmatic assumptions, and who was the first to use the term liberalis theologia (“liberal theology”). Semler’s Treatise on the Free Investigation of the Canon marks his break with the orthodox view of Scripture and inspiration. In light of Semler’s work, one of the main issues of German Enlightenment theology was its reformulation of the doctrine of Scripture. Through his attempt to harmonize human reason with biblical revelation, Semler became the major exponent of Enlightenment theology and a leading neologist.
Although he is not as a well-known figure, scholars acknowledge Semler’s significance to modern theological ideas and his pioneering role in liberal Christian thought. Semler considered himself a new reformer who worked to free the church from its authoritative and traditional control. By the end of the eighteenth century, biblical scholars were treating the Bible in a historical and rationalistic manner. With the rise of historical criticism, only some truths associated with the Christian faith could any longer be endorsed. German universities played a major role in producing what one recent scholar calls the “academic Bible.” At the University of Berlin, for example, different movements and ideas triggered a crisis that questioned the credibility of Christian religion.
Books At a Glance:
Highlight for us the role of Friedrich Schleiermacher in all this.
Aubert:
Friedrich Schleiermacher, known as the father of modern theology, established the liberal theological path. Schleiermacher brought a “Copernican Revolution” to Christian religion, one that was as significant as Kant’s innovation in philosophy. Whereas Kant placed religion in the moral realm and Hegel stressed the rational character of religion, Schleiermacher associated it with human experience. Schleiermacher believed that dogmatics provide a suitable explanation of Christian consciousness. As I mentioned earlier, one of the key features of liberalism was its agenda for reconstructing the Christian faith in light of Enlightenment culture. In his Glaubenslehre, Schleiermacher attempted to mediate between traditional faith and enlightened society, thus reconstructing Protestant theology for contemporary times.
Schleiermacher sought to legitimize theology by making it part of the sciences in modern universities. In my book I discuss how Schleiermacher’s theological methodology emerged in the context of the modern German university, and how he applied the concept of modern science (Wissenschaft) to theology, defining theology as “a positive science.” His new theological approach is clearly manifested in the way he rejected scholastic dogmatics and replaced the loci method with an organic approach tied to a central dogma.
Books At a Glance:
What was “mediating theology”? And how was it important for American theology in particular?
Aubert:
Historically, mediating theology, along with liberal theology and confessional theology, emerged as an influential movement in Germany in the 1820s. As I explain in my book, while mediating theology is not considered a homogeneous school, it shared common characteristics and themes with Schleiermacher. The school was particularly influenced by Schleiermacher’s attempts to develop a theology around the subjective meeting of faith with a Christocentric approach. Schleiermacher developed a Christocentric methodology for dogmatics. Mediating theologians accepted this methodology and consequently adopted a theological method based on a central dogma. Mediating theologians such as Karl Hagenbach, August Twesten, Johannes Jacobus van Oosterzee, and others wrote new dogmatic works, thereby reshaping theological prolegomena and the loci method of earlier Protestant dogmatic texts.
In light of the historical context of mediating theology, it is helpful to view it as conciliation between supernaturalism and rationalism, as well as between old and new doctrines and a concentration on Christology, especially Christ’s incarnation and true humanity. Accordingly, mediating theologians are best described as Christocentric theologians. Mediating theologians generally attempted to create a balance between traditional Protestantism and modern science, stressing a subjective and Christocentric religion that had international appeal, especially to American theologians.
Mediating theology exerted a significant influence on American theology. Ideas concerning scientific and Christocentric theologies spread to nineteenth-century America via transatlantic networks, migration, the book trade, and translation work. In particular, mediating theology played an important role in the development of the Mercersburg and other theological schools in North America. Nineteenth-century American theologians profited enormously from the dogmatic, historical, and biblical works of nineteenth-century scholars linked to mediating theology. In my book I discuss several individual mediating theologians in detail — for example, Carl Ullmann and Karl Hagenbach.
Books At a Glance:
Most of our readers will be at least somewhat acquainted with Charles Hodge, the eminent theologian of nineteenth-century Old Princeton. But I suspect few of us are already acquainted with Emanuel Vogel Gerhart – or with the German Reformed Church, for that matter. Could you tell us about him briefly? How is he important in this discussion?
Aubert:
Emanuel Vogel Gerhart was a German Reformed theologian born in Pennsylvania who studied at Marshall College and Mercersburg Seminary, where he came under the influence of.…
Editor’s Note: We will continue our interview with Dr. Aubert here tomorrow.
Buy the books
THE GERMAN ROOTS OF NINETEENTH-CENTURY AMERICAN THEOLOGY