Historical theology [hi•STOR•i•kəl θē•Ä•le•jē, noun] The study of what different Christians believed at different points in history.
Contrary to popular belief, Christians haven’t always believed the same things. And no, I’m not talking about the difference between one denomination and another (i.e. Baptists vs. Catholics, vs. Episcopalians, vs. Presbyterians) nor the difference between one nation and another (i.e. Christianity in the United States vs. Christianity in South Korea, or Brazil, or China). I’m talking about the difference between the 21st century and the 20th. Or the 19th, the 15th, the 10th, the fourth, and the first centuries.
Yep, Christian theology has changed over time. Some might say evolved. (And some would say devolved.) Some will claim it’s a process where all our wrong ideas have been gradually purged from us by the Holy Spirit. Others will claim it’s no such thing; fr’instance, just when we thought we were rid of the heresy of Arianism, the Jehovah’s Witnesses showed up and brought it back big-time.
What you believe about historical theology—and Christian history, for that matter—pretty much depends on what you believe about history.
Your historical worldview.
If you believe it’s a march of progress—where we humans are doing better than our forebears, and will continue to improve and solve all humanity’s problems—well, that’s the point of view of modern humanism and progressivism. It’s still the view found in most American history textbooks: America, though it still has challenges to face, is still the best country in the world, and getting better all the time. (And woe to the school board who says otherwise.)
If, on the contrary, you believe it’s descending into chaos—where we humans are doing worse than our forebears, and it’ll get worse and worse till something drastic has to happen—that’s the point of view of Marxism, which believes a violent class revolution will step in and force a change; Objectivism, which believes the same thing (but the capitalists will win instead of the Marxists); and Dispensationalism, which teaches Jesus will step in and fix everything. These are the 19th and 20th century’s alternatives to progressivism, and they have their fans in American society as well.
The rest of us believe neither—that sometimes we improve, and sometimes we degrade, and we swing back and forth in cycles between the two. (For Christians, the cycle ends with Jesus’s return; in eastern religions, the cycle continues forever.) It’s considered an “eastern” point of view—but we see it in both Judges and Ecclesiastes, so it’s found in western culture as well. It’s also considered a postmodern point of view, but in my experience there are pomos in both the march-of-progress and going-to-hell-in-a-handbasket camps.
Same with Christian points of view. Certain Christians claim the “Christian worldview” must be a progressive one: Jesus is purifying his church, and giving us greater wisdom and maturity and revelation and so forth, and means for us to fix the world and contribute to his Kingdom. Other Christians insist we gotta be pessimistic about history, for look at how bad things are in Revelation; surely violence and plague and devils-gone-wild are part of our future. And the rest of us (including, I admit, me) figure the Judges/Ecclesiastes view of a time for this and a time for that—generations who follow God, succeeded by generations who don’t, succeeded by revival and a generation who does again—seems more consistent with both the bible and human history.
Okay. What has this to do with historical theology? Well, everything. If you’re progressive, you’re gonna see Christian theology as improving and maturing, and be more likely to trust present-day theologians than ancient ones. If you’re pessimistic, you’ll see it as getting worse, and more likely to trust ancient writers than current ones. And if history is cyclical, you’ll see theology have its ups and downs: Low points, in which worldly-minded Christians warp Christian thought; and high points, in which Christ-centered Christians pull it back toward Jesus. Same with theologians: Some speaking bent words from a bent culture; some speaking righteously from the midst of revival.
If you never thought about what you believe about history, you’ll have a mishmash of different beliefs. Like the Christians who think the Protestant Reformation was a high point in the middle of history, but overall the world is falling apart. Or the political Christians who adopt the optimistic view when their party is in power, and the pessimistic view when it’s not.
How we study historical theology.
There are many ways to study history, and historical theology as well. The two most popular are these.
Study great theologians. Pick one of the great Christian thinkers in history, and read up on them. Read a bunch of biographies of St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, Karl Barth, C.S. Lewis, or others. Read what they themselves wrote. Find out what they thought and taught.
Some of them were the originators of certain popular Christian beliefs, and a good biographer will point out what Christians used to think before that theologian came round and pitched her or his unique view. You might be surprised to find out some of our views, even though they’re based on the bible, actually weren’t held by every orthodox Christian since the first century.
Study the history of a belief. What did different Christians in history think about, fr’instance, speaking in tongues? Or about how Christians ought to run their churches? Whether women could be in church leadership at all? What the End Times were supposed to look like?
All these subjects, and more, have been discussed by Christian thinkers and writers since the beginning. Tons of books have been written on the subject. You can find ’em on the Internet easily. So… what have Christians thought about these issues? And do their views sound anything like the views we hear in our churches today?
Most of the reason my own theology has changed so significantly from my Fundamentalist days, has been because I looked at what earlier ages of Christians believed about orthodoxy, miracles, prophecy, the End Times, and all sorts of subjects—and realized the churches I grew up in were not following the consensus of Christian history. (And no surprise, they know this; it’s why they pooh-pooh Christian history so much. It’s not on their side.)
No, this isn’t to say the consensus of Christian history is automatically right. Christians make that mistake all the time, and treat the Church fathers as if they’re not sisters and brothers in Christ—people who might be wrong, might be right, and it’s our duty to figure out how we can profit by their teaching and example.
But obviously Christians in the past were wrong when it came to slavery, racism, sexism, and so many other subjects. Culture has way more of a drag on Christendom than we’d often care to admit to ourselves. For that reason, it’s a good idea to pay attention to the cultures of the people you read about. The reason they weren’t big on Christian equality, even though Jesus obviously is, and the apostle Paul obviously was, was because their culture didn’t believe in it; they still had kings and nobles, freemen and slaves. Theology isn’t done in a vaccum. Don’t forget!
The value of historical theology.
As you might be able to tell, when we study what other people thought about Jesus and the bible, we start to pay attention to why they thought so… and we start to pay a little more attention to why we think as we do.
Like I said, culture has a drag on Christendom. It drags us too. There are certain things Americans believe about Jesus, simply because we’re Americans and it’s how Americans are raised to think. Fr’instance we imagine the Kingdom of God, once Jesus returns, is gonna be way more democratic than other cultures expect. Why do we believe this? Because we practice democracy. Sometimes automatically: When the group can’t figure out what to do next, we take a vote, and expect everybody has an equal vote. It’s the fairest way to go, right? Democracy is awesome, right? Why wouldn’t there be democracy in the Kingdom? And so we utterly miss the oxymoron of a democracy under Jesus’s absolute rule.
So we’re a little blind to our own cultural biases. But this means we’re totally not blind to other cultures’ biases. And when we object, “They shouldn’t do it that way; our way is better,” we’re stating our bias. Whether we realize it’s bias or not, might take a little bit longer… but give it time. Eventually we realize it.
We also realize there are multiple ways of looking at the very same thing. There’s not one single Christian worldview; there are many. There’s the 21st century Baptist view… but there’s also the 17th century Baptist view. If they don’t line up, why is the Baptist in 2014 right, and the Baptist in 1664 wrong? (Or vice-versa?) It’s easy to leap to the knee-jerk conclusion another denomnation is wrong; it’s a lot harder when it’s the same denomination, in a different era.
Plus, as we see how the previous theologians practiced good theology, we can better learn how to practice good theology ourselves.