The earth is the LORD's, and all its fullness,
the world and those who dwell therein,
For He has founded it upon the seas,
and established it upon the waters.
Psalm 24:1-2
Scripture, inspired by God records this fact, that the earth, and all that is in it is His. This fact must be the foundation for any truthful investigation of history so that we do not deter or become derailed by false presuppostions. Our history has been influenced by many things, especially by men who held various ideologies or theologies. We must know them and their ideologies, their effect that they had upon their then world and how their ideologies,or theologies have an affect on our world. Our world is full of contradictions, both in the secular realm and in the religious realm. In Christianity there is much confusion with the many theologies, i.e., Pentecostalism, Charismatics, Evangelicals, Amish, Mennonites, Anglican, Lutheran, and Presbyterians. My involvement in this study is to give information that will aid us in our search as to how these various opinions, and theologies developed and whether or not they are Scripturally truthful. What caused these various theologies, ideologies? This is our search, a search that will take time and thought. It is important, not for salvation, rather for our daily lives, our growth in the truth and in faith built upon knowledge, a knowledge that will not make cause for doubt that the Christian Relgion is of God and is His people, and grow us in Authentic Biblical Faith.
Before we can study history we
must become familiar with the various elements that make up methodologies for
investigation. The first element is the scientific element. History of the
church will contain a scientific element because history uses scientific
methods; i.e., work of the archeologist, and those who make available
information from material remains of the past which an archeologist has
unearthed. A study of the catacombs is one such scientific investigation that
teaches us much about the Early church. Literary criticism is a technique that
aids in the evaluation of any documents of the history of the church. The
original documents will take precedence over all other documents, those of an
archeologist, documents, and any living witness who may have taken part in the
event. The questions: who, what, when, and where, are important questions and
this evaluation will give the historian important information for his
investigation. Time and place must be considered, that is the culture, as
historical events as a conditioning element.
An
historian as in investigator faces a problem as to the meaning of these facts
and he must make an attempt to find meaning of the facts ascertained. The
definition of philosophy is important as some cavil at this word as problematic
for the Christian who has his foundation in faith. Philosophy according to
Webster’s Dictionary (1997) 1. The rational investigation of the truths and
principles of being, knowledge, or conduct. 3. The critical study of he basic
principles and concepts of a particular branch of knowledge: the philosophy of
science. 4. A system of principles for guidance in practical affairs; i.e., a
philosophy of life.[1] Historians
fall into three classifications: Pessimists, optimists, and pessimistic optimists.
The pessimist historian adopts a materialistic approach to reality. They are
preoccupied, or emphasize upon material objects, comforts, and considerations,
as opposed to spiritual or intellectual values. This is a philosophic theory
that regards matter as constituting the universe, and all phenomena, including
those of mind, as due to material agencies.[2]
The pessimist philosophy is obsessed with the failure of man in history as
Oswald Spengler’s, (1880–1936 A.D.), The Decline of the West.[3]
In this work is the illustration to this form of approach to history. Spengler
is concerned with civilizations rather than with nations. He formed his
argument that each civilization goes through a cycle of birth, adolescence,
maturity, decay, and death. Spengler believed that the Western civilization is
in its period of decay and will soon die along with Christianity. With his
belief of man’s failure Spengler cannot see any progress in history. This then
is that history is a series of cycles identical with each other and
superimposed upon each other. This pessimism and paradigm for the history of
the world is illustrated in these two statements:
“Every springtime
of a culture is ipso facto the springtime of a new city type and civism” and
“At this level all civilizations enter upon a stage, which lasts for
centuries of appalling depopulation. The whole pyramid of cultural man
vanishes. It crumbles from the summit, fist the world–series, then the
provincial forms and finally the land itself, whose blood has incontinently
poured into the towns, merely to bolster them up awhile. At the last, only the
primitive blood remains, alive, but robbed of its strongest and most promising
elements. This reside is the Fellah type” ( A worker who constitutes the
backbone) (Italics mine)[4]
The
optimists have a view of history that is depicted as an ascending graph or
successively rising levels of a spiral. Unlike Dante’s (1265-1293?), Inferno,
where Virgil the poet is led downward spiraling in circles of hell and seeing
the nightmare, those evils that made deposition for those who not only
committed such evil, but would not repent. Then in the end Vigil is led up and
out of hell:
“The Guide and I into
that hidden road now entered, to return to the bright world; and without care
of having any rest: we mounted up, he first and I the second till I beheld through
a round aperture some of those beauteous things which Heaven doth bear; thence
we came forth to rebhold the stars” (The Inferno, Canto XXXIV, p. 179; italics
mine).[5]
Dante in the Inferno did
not find that man could change their sinful condition and place. He was not
pessimistic, rather he saw sin for what it was, sin, and a failure of man to be
able to save himself. The optimist being humanistic and the see man as the main determinative factor in history. The
humanist accepts biological and social evolution. We can see this in the works
of Arnold Toynbee (1889-1975 A.D.), was a British economic
historian also noted for his social commitment and desire to improve
the living conditions of the working
classes[6] and a great
modern philosopher of history who agrees with Spengler that a person should
study the history of civilizations. Spengler being a pessimist who saw no
progress in history, Toynbee believed that each civilization makes progress
toward its goal, the earth as a province of the kingdom of God. Arnold Toynbee
had a spiritual side to him in his approach to history, yet he accepted modern
Biblical criticism and the theory of evolution.
Georg
Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831 A.D.)
was a German
philosopher,
and a major figure in German Idealism. His historicist
and idealist
account of reality
revolutionized European philosophy and was an important
precursor to Continental philosophy and Marxism.
Hegel's thinking can be understood as a constructive development within the
broad tradition that includes Plato and Kant. Hegel developed a comprehensive
philosophical framework, or "system", of Absolute
idealism to account in an integrated and developmental way for the
relation of mind
and nature.
Therefore, Hegel looked upon history as the unfolding of the Absolute Spirit in
the development of human freedom. To him, progress is by a process, a series of
successive contradictions that are reconciled until the Absolute Spirit is
fully manifested in history.
Another
man, Karl Marx (1818–1883 A.D.), best known not as a philosopher but as a
revolutionary communist, whose works inspired the foundation of many communist
regimes in the twentieth century. Marx belong to the school of optimists and
borrowed Hegel’s logic but he disavowed Hegel’s view of reality, and that all
human institutions, including religion, are determined by the economic
processes of production. For Marx matter is in flux and is the only reality. He
maintained that there well be an end to class struggles with a victory for the
workers and the establishment of a classless society. This philosophical view
emphasizes that man has the power to redeem himself and his world in the same
way of Hegel and Toynbee.
There are two more elements to discuss and this will be the thrust of the next blogs. We are establishing the methods that have made a cause for the various thinking, the various ideologies, and theologies. It may be a bit laborious, but it is worth the while, your faith will grow and your relationship with God, and His Son Jesus Christ will flourish.
For there is nothing hidden
which will not be revealed,
nor has anything been kept secret
but that it should come to light.
If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.
Mark 4:22-23
Pray for guidance: God will give it to you
Richard L. Crumb
[1] Random House
Webster’s College Dictionary, Random House, New York, second edition 1997.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Knopf, Afred
A.; New York, 1939.
[4]
Spengler, Oswald; The Decline of the West; chapter IV, Cities and Peoples (A)
The Soul of the City, Volume II, pp. 91, 105; London Allen
& Unwin; retrieved 10/31/2012: archive.org/details/declineofwest02spenuoft
[5] Alighieri,
Dante; The Inferno, translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Barnes &
Noble Classics, New York, NY, 2003.
[6]
F. C.
Montague, "Arnold Toynbee", in Social Science, Municipal and Federal
Government, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University (1889), pp. 5-53.
Retrieved from the internet 11/1/2102, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnold_Toynbee#cite_note-0.
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