The ABC's of Calvinism

***QUOTE***

Sometime you guys are going to have to explain to me how it is that some "Calvinists" seem to believe in infant baptism, and others do not but they are still claiming they are Reformed but Baptists, but not Calvinists?

Maybe you might take a stab at a post "Calvinism for Dummies" or something like that trying to make sense of all the various "confessions" and the various five-point, or four-point, or infant baptism, or not, etc. etc. etc.

***END-QUOTE***

That’s a fair question. To some extent that question has already been addressed (not only in what I said, but the comments left by James Anderson and Jus Divinum):

http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2005/12/whose-covenant-theology.html

But Paul McCain’s question goes a little beyond that, so I’ll both repeat myself and make some additional observations.

1.Although Calvinism takes its name from a particular individual, it is not as much of a one-man vision as is the Lutheran tradition. Hence, there is rather more doctrinal diversity within the Reformed tradition than there is within the Lutheran tradition.

2.Every theological tradition is, to some extent, a historical accident. As with any historical phenomenon in the history of ideas, the Reformed tradition is rather fluid, with somewhat fuzzy boundaries in time, space, and content. The doctrinal package is, in some measure, eclectic.

3.There are different ways of identifying the Reformed tradition.

a)You might take certain representative credal statements as your point of reference. These reflect differences of national character and political history.

The Westminster Confession of Faith is the doctrinal standard of confessional, English-speaking Presbyterians.

The Three Forms of Unity supply the doctrinal standard of the Dutch-Reformed.

The London Baptist Confession of Faith (1644/77/89) represents the doctrinal standard of Reformed Baptists.

The New Hampshire Baptist Confession represents the doctrinal standard of Sovereign Grace Baptists.

The Old Baptist Confession of Faith, subsequently revised by John Gill, William Gadsby, and Joseph Philpot, represents the doctrine standard of Strict & Particular Baptists.

The Thirty-Nine Articles and especially the Lambeth Articles represent the doctrinal standard of Reformed Anglicans.

The Confession of Faith of the Calvinistic Methodists is the doctrinal standard of Welsh Calvinism.

Creeds are consensus documents, so they express mainstream opinion, although it may be the mainstream opinion of a particular nationality, ethnicity, or subculture.

b) You might take certain representative theologians as your point of reference (e.g. Bavinck, Calvin, Cunningham, Edwards, Gill, Hodge, Lloyd-Jones, Murray, Owen, Turretin, Warfield).

c) You might take the inner logic of certain doctrinal matrices as your point of reference (e.g. TULIP).

4.As with any faith-community, the question of who’s in and who’s out is a consensus question. You cannot have community without a certain measure of unity. If enough people can’t agree on enough things, they can’t function at a communal level. But there’s no abstract, uniform answer for where to draw the line.

For example, the Reformed tradition has spawned certain offshoots, such as the Amyraldins, Remonstrants, Hyper-Calvinists and antinomians.

These developments and deviations have been repudiated by mainstream confessional Calvinism. So, for instance, Strict & Particular Baptists, due to their Hyper-Calvinist and antinomian sympathies, would not be widely regarded as expressive of authentic Calvinism. The same holds true, for different reasons, of Arminians and 4-point Calvinists.

5.But some issues are not as clear-cut. Is covenant theology a Reformed distinctive? How do we classify Christians like Sovereign Grace Baptists or fundamentalists like S. Lewis Johnson who subscribe to the 5 points of Calvinism (TULIP), but reject covenant theology? That’s a judgment call.

6.There are also differences of emphasis. The Puritans and Welsh Calvinists accentuate “experimental religion.”

7.There are parallel debates within Lutheranism. Was Flacius a Lutheran? Or Schleiermacher? Or Bultmann? Is the Lutheran World Federation or the ECLA an authentic expression of the Lutheran tradition?

8. Reformed Baptists are Calvinists because infant baptism is not a Reformed distinctive. Most Christian traditions observe infant baptism. Hence, that does not demarcate Calvinism from rival theological traditions.

Likewise, the efficacy of the sacraments is not a Reformed distinctive.

Calvinists differ over covenant theology, church/state relations, polity, the sacraments, open or closed communion, the rule of worship, and the terms of church membership.

9. Superficially speaking, a 4-point Calvinist is a Christian who subscribes to TULIP except for limited atonement.

However, 4-point Calvinism is a misnomer since it redefines each of the remaining points.

It affirms original sin, but denies spiritual inability.

It rejects unconditional election in favor of conditional election—contingent on foreseen faith.

It rejects limited atonement in favor of unlimited atonement.

It affirms freewill and thereby denies irresistible grace.

It denies the doctrine of perseverance in favor of an antinomian version of eternal security.

If you like, I can flesh out the details of this classification system. For now I’m simply presenting a thumbnail taxonomy.