Prettiness is next to godliness

Perry Robinson posted the following quote on his blog:

“At the same time, in spite of these laudable efforts, [Paul Jacobs and Richard Muller] it is difficult to avoid the impresison that at a crucial level Calvin has failed to integrate his doctrine of election thoroughly with the broader trinitarian theology of revelation, redemption, and human response that we are highlighting here. For example, in Comm. John 17:9, Calvin asserts that Christ ‘commends to the Father only those whom the Father himself willingly loves.’ Here, as at many other points, the will of the Father is understood as something omniously arbitrary, rather than as being intrinsically and perichoretically related to the divine manifestation of grace in the Son. Examples could be multiplied. It appears that in spite of the helpful trinitarian direction Calvin has taken in formulating his undersanding of the divine-human relationship, at the point of the doctrine of election his normal emphasis on the thorough perichoresis of Father, Son and Spirit in the divine operations has been effectively and inexplicably suspended.”

Philip Walker Butin, Revelation, Redemption and Response: Calvin’s Trinitarian Understanding of the Divine-Human Relationship, Oxford, 1995, 168, ednt. 6.

“It may be taken as further evidence of his committment to the perichoresis of the trinitarian hypostaseis in God’s economic work that Calvin consistently qualifies the statement that ‘God is the proper object of faith’ with the immediate affirmation that access to God is only through Christ (1159 Institutes II.6.2,4; cf. III.2.6), which appears to turn the relationship around, asserting that the Father offers Christ to us ‘as the goal of our faith’). However, as we have suggested earlier, Calvin is not entirely consistent in focusing faith on God’s benevolence as expressed in Christ. His commitment to the doctrine of the ‘double decree’ (cf. 1559 Institutes III.21.1ff.) leads to the a priori exclusion of the reprobate from this Christological access to God by faith. This results at certain points in severe tension between his otherwise trinitarian paradigm of revelation, redemption, and human response and his doctrine of election. For example, in the1159 Institutes III.2.9-12, he appears to theologically justify the concept of the ‘double decree’ by making a deliberate exception to his normally characteristic insistence that the work of the Son and the Spirit be held together in the exonomy of redemption. Thus-in the attempt to explain why some who appear to believe are not ultimately saved (vf. Hebrews 6:4-6)-he can speak of a ‘lower working of the Spirit…in the reprobate.’ This stirs in them a sense that God is merciful toward them and allows them to ‘recognize his grace,’ but apparently operates apart from the effectual grace that God offers in the Son, and hence does not lead to saving faith (1559 Institutes III.2.11). It seems that Calvin never faced the omnious theological implicaitons of this move for a doctrine of the Trinity that otherwise wants to hold that God’s immanent trinitarian relations are consistently reflected in the ad extra activity of the hypostaseis. In addition, at this point he seems inexplicably to suspend his otherwise rigorous insistence on the thoroughgoing perichoresis for the doctrine of the divine decrees. Rather, he applies that paradigm only to the issue of the elect believer’s assurance of election, while the operation of election itself is apparently excempted from the consistency with God’s otherwise trinitarian nature, and left to an inscrutable divine will.”

Ibid., 189., ednt. 81.

http://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2010/02/22/de-deo-uno-in-calvin/

Butin’s objection, which Perry quotes with approval, is ultimately aesthetic. He apparently finds fault with Calvin’s theology because Calvin’s doctrine of predestination spoils the elegant triadic symmetry.

Butin notes that Calvin does this in light of how he understood passages like Jn 17:9 and Heb 6:4-6.

What’s striking about this criticism is that Butin doesn’t take issue with Calvin’s exegesis of Jn 17 (or Heb 6). After all, doesn’t Jn 17 repeatedly single out the Father as the person of the Godhead who “gives” a people to the Son?

What does Butin (or Perry) think that Calvin is supposed to do in the face of this fact? Should Calvin say, Yes, Jesus–in Jn 17–assigns election to the person of the Father, but that would introduce an unsightly, asymmetrical dynamic into the Trinity; therefore, it’s better to sacrifice what Jesus said to preserve the elegant symmetry of our theological system than sacrifice an artificial symmetry to preserve what Jesus said.

Calvin was a poor theologian because he clung to the uncouth idea that what we believe God is like should correspond to…well…to what God is like. You know, God’s self-revelation.

If only Calvin brought a more artistic sensibility to doing theology. Pretty it up like a formal garden with sculptured hedges and geometrical figures.