We bother studying history and other social sciences so we can more intelligently recognize how we got where we are today, and contrast that against where God said we should be. We are then in a better position to plot a course in life that maximizes His glory by calling attention to the difference between the two.
As we absorb the basic outline of historical events, we can make room for more detail, more nuance while we avoid getting bogged down in mere anecdote. Most important and at the same time most difficult is the study of cultural influences that provide the character of human action in the aggregate. We are forced to make generalizations, while noting they are no more than that. Without such generalization, we cannot possibly understand the details, for the context gives meaning to the exceptions.
First, the generalized thesis: The Reformation is an entirely natural expression of the birth of middle class culture. Churches rooted in that period of history represent in general terms the rise of middle class political power. Those churches are inherently political, both internally and highly engaged in public policy. That much should be obvious simply because Luther’s actions constituted a parallel ecclesiastical political movement to the rise of secular merchant burgers in Europe. The result was as much political as theological. We do well to remember theology is a human activity itself, and the notion of orthodoxy is directly tied to the Fall, not redemption.
In the Bible, recognizing a heresy does not rest on orthodoxy, but on the more subtle moral discernment that sees how an idea can lead people away from God’s revelation in terms of commitment to His character. In other words, Jesus and His teaching forbids using the sword to enforce doctrine. The ultimate Christian “weapon” is voluntary association. Any use or reference to civil law in that context is an abomination.
But it took only a couple of centuries for the Judaizers to seduce Christians back into politicized religion. Hellenism is the fundamental trap here. The biggest threat to Pharisee self-concept is surrendering the power of human reason and kneeling before the Creator without any pretense. So Christians began thinking it was necessary to organize their churches along secular political lines, forsaking the Hebrew feudalism of the original churches during the First Century. The organized Christian religion was then easily seduced by Constantine. Following that path, it was no surprise this politicized church leadership came up with a pope around 600 AD.
But the Greco-Roman magisterial politics were exchanged for Germanic tribal feudalism when church scholars consciously decided to reduce the threat from pagan German warlords. So we have fairly solid evidence it was entirely conscious that the church bought into Germanic tribal mythology as official doctrine to make Christian religion palatable to the heathen hordes. The church courted the tribal rulers, and eventually the rulers felt the need for the church’s influence. Two centuries later we have the Holy Roman Emperor, Charlemagne.
While the church had been condemning strange teachings for quite some time, it now became fully and legally a matter of life and death. It would require several more centuries before someone found sufficient political backing to demand some changes in this situation. The end of the Middle Ages in Europe was the birth of the urban middle class. Because it was centered on the political and economic power of guilds, it constitutes the fertile ground for the birth of socialism. Western feudalism was always about ownership and control of the means of production, primarily land. The serfs were part of the dirt, so if you took control of some real estate, the resident population was part of the deal.
By contrast, the English experience was a little different. Once the Anglo-Saxons got off on their own in the Misty Isles, their contact with the peculiar Celtic and related tribal folks brought forth a different way of doing feudalism. England had a far higher incidence of independent peasants and far earlier than the European merchants arose. The Reformation in England was still rooted in feudal magisterial splendor of the Anglican Church, and faced the existence of a very old yeoman culture of middle-class peasants. Yeomanry created a different kind of political conflict that flavored religious thinking. It brought a different result that split in several directions, resulting in the Congregationalists, Baptists and Methodist branches — and it bogs down quickly with generalizations difficult to make. The Scottish Presbyterians are quite different from the Lutherans, coming later in the same game. (Lutherans pretend to ignore Luther’s late vociferous embrace of Calvinism.)
But today’s reformed churches share a lot with political socialism. Most churches rooted in America are more of the uniquely English Enlightenment mold and share much with classical republican political philosophy. The Catholic and Anglican churches are more or less Western feudal in structure and outlook. The Orthodox churches are more Byzantine.
Again, we make generalizations because that’s the only way we can understand the bigger picture.
For example, one of my readers pointed me to a link on the Chalcedon site. I’ve commented in the past on Dominionism as yet another branch of reformed religion, a sort of Presbyterian return to early Reformation elements. It carries the same deep stain of insisting on using the state, but in the current context, that means first forcing the state to change. In their eyes, “biblical law” is little more than the same political framework of the worst of Reformation oppression of those who didn’t feel called by God to cling to the one and only church permitted in their place of residence. A Dominionist government would be brutal and repressive, though with the present emphasis on “taking back” the civil government from the current elites, it makes sounds of libertarian democratic reforms, etc. They realize they have to make their case and convince folks to go along, but once in control, you’d probably want to flee their dominion.
So long as religion rests on anything other than the ancient Hebrew tribal feudalism, I want no part of it. That the ambient cultural mythology affects religious outlook is patently obvious. That religion as a human effort to implement the divine call tends to reflect something of the ambient culture is also obvious. It reminds us that God calls us where we are. He works in the context to bring His name glory. But insofar as we are able, we should cleave to the original model revealed in the most primitive context of Israel before the Conquest. The Bible keeps hinting of that time before they settled into cities as some kind of ideal existence, not so much literally, but in the essence of how it made you live in total dependence on God. You took very little for granted in that context. From my own personal experience I am convinced that in our current context, we have not tried near hard enough to get as close as possible to that.
