Today we continue our discussion with Dr. Annette Aubert concerning her important work, The German Roots of Nineteenth-Century American Theology. If you missed part 1 of this interview you can catch up with it here.
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 Friedrich August Rauch and John William Nevin. Gerhart was a pastor, a college president, and a professor of systematic theology in different institutions associated with the German Reformed Church. The German Reformed Church started as a division of Calvinist Christianity, theologically aligned with the Heidelberg Catechism. Members of the German Reformed Church began to settle in Pennsylvania in the eighteenth century.
Gerhart is best known for his contributions to philosophy and theology. Gerhart played an important role in systematizing Mercersburg theology, writing an important two-volume work entitled Institutes of Christian Religion. In my book I explore the importance of his innovative dogmatic work, which was distinct from other nineteenth-century American efforts in that area. His Institutes was the first American attempt to write a Christocentric systematic theology in the tradition of mediating theology. Unlike the Anglo-Saxon approach based on Francis Bacon’s inductive method, Gerhart applied the German notions of science and a priori principle to his theology.
Gerhart is considered important because both he and Charles Hodge lived during a period marked by far-reaching changes and new challenges to the Christian faith. Both Hodge and Gerhart wrote major dogmatic works for an American audience, addressing modern issues from different theological starting points. Unlike Hodge, Gerhart accepted the key positions of mediating theologians. He not only accepted their central dogmatic approach — the Christ-idea — as a theological starting point, he also welcomed their scientific theology in response to post-Enlightenment challenges. Similar to Schleiermacher and his successors, he discarded seventeenth-century scholastic dogmatic texts, arguing that they did not fit with the requirements of modern science.
Books At a Glance:
How did Gerhart’s view of the atonement contrast with that of Hodge?
Aubert:
Unlike modern theologians, Charles Hodge promoted a doctrine of atonement that emphasized vicarious satisfaction. For Hodge, the idea of satisfaction stood at the center of atonement. In contrast, in Gerhart’s atonement formulation the main concern was overcoming a theological perspective that only focused on satisfaction. Gerhart skillfully incorporated the views of mediating theologians into his organic atonement doctrine and in his replies to the one-sided theories of nineteenth-century American theologians. He specifically criticized those who promoted atonement theories based on an inductive method that treated Christ’s work in isolation. Gerhart instead promoted an atonement theology that underscored the three redemptive acts of Christ: his incarnation, death, and resurrection.
Influenced by both mediating theologians and early church fathers, Gerhart combined parts of various atonement theories such as recapitulation, deification, penal satisfaction, and the Christus Victor motif. Like Schleiermacher and mediating theologians, Gerhart blended old and new doctrines, approached the doctrine of atonement in light of the Christ-idea, and emphasized Christ’s person rather than his work — a view with which Hodge strongly disagreed. In the context of his mediating approach, Gerhart believed that Anselm’s satisfaction theory was imperfect because it lacked the positive benefits of redemption.
Books At a Glance:
How did Hodge differ from Gerhart in terms of theological method and approach?
Aubert:
In his Systematic Theology, Hodge used the loci method and prolegomena of post-Reformation dogmatics, especially their emphasis on Scripture as the source for formulating theology. He resisted Gerhart’s central dogma approach. Another important point is that Hodge’s theological approach was shaped by his biblical work. In contrast to Gerhart and the mediating theologians, Hodge advocated an objective starting point based on biblical revelation. Also in contrast to Gerhart, who used German Idealism to formulate his theology, Hodge employed Baconianism to construct an objective theology. However, while Hodge viewed Baconianism and Scottish Common Sense Realism as being helpful to his work, he did not adopt those ideas uncritically. Instead, he simply used them as philosophical and scientific tools. Hodge’s method was clearly linked to the concepts of the noetic effects of sin and the instrumental use of reason. Here Hodge’s efforts can be viewed as a continuation of Reformed orthodoxy.
Books At a Glance:
What is distinctive about your book? What is the contribution you are hoping to make?
Aubert:
My book represents an attempt to contextualize two important North American theologians in a transatlantic context. By contextualizing Emanuel Gerhart’s mediating theology, it becomes an important foundation for investigating nineteenth-century theology in America in general and Mercersburg theology in particular. The book offers an alternative to the standard approach to analyzing Charles Hodge, exploring his work in the contexts of post-Enlightenment culture and German theology, and explaining his scientific theology in terms of his exegetical theology and his dialogues with August Tholuck, Ernst Hengstenberg, and other German theologians.
I have tried to make a contribution to an analysis of mediating theology as a neglected yet important strand of nineteenth-century Protestant theology, and to stress its inspiration for nineteenth-century American divinity. It will also hopefully serve as a starting point for new transatlantic studies and twenty-first century reflections on theological method and doctrinal formulation.
Books At a Glance:
Do you have more writing projects for Historical Theology in the plans? Any new books we can look for?
Aubert:
I am currently working on several projects that deal with similar topics addressed in German Roots of Nineteenth-Century American Theology. For example, I explore the transatlantic networks involving American and German evangelical scholars in terms of scientific religion, theological methods, doctrine, and education, and other essential themes.
Buy the books
THE GERMAN ROOTS OF NINETEENTH-CENTURY AMERICAN THEOLOGY