A TRINITARIAN THEOLOGY OF RELIGIONS:
An Evangelical Proposal
By Gerald R. McDermott & Harold A. Netland
Oxford University Press. 331 pages. £19.99
ISBN 978 0 199 751 839
In a world where four-fifths of the population worship gods other than the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ such a volume as this is urgently needed.
The co-authors are both distinguished scholars, McDermott as Professor of Religion at Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia, and Netland as Professor of Religion and Intercultural Studies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois. It is no surprise, then, that this is a rigorous academic study in which non-specialists (like myself) will meet countless names they have never met before.
Theology of religions
This is not a study in Comparative Religion, but in the relatively new discipline of Theology of Religions, which explores, first, why there is such a thing as religion and, secondly, why there are so many varieties of it. I say, ‘relatively new’, because John Calvin had already noted that there is no nation on earth which does not have its god. He had explained this by the fact that God has sown the Seed of Religion in every human heart and he had accounted for the countless misshapen ways in which the Seed develops from our invariable tendency to suppress, distort and pervert our knowledge of God.
But while this is not a study in Comparative Religion it does alert us to some fascinating details. For example, the Qur’an never explicitly commands either the love of God or the love of our neighbour; a scholar by the name of Amos Yong believes that the Holy Spirit may be at work even in religions usually considered demonic; and there are some anthropologists, apparently, who suggest that cannibalism can sometimes enhance social cohesion (on which it is tempting to comment: ‘Thanks for that little titbit.’)
McDermott and Young have misgivings about the traditional three-fold classification of Christian views on other religions: Exclusivist, Inclusivist or Pluralist. This taxonomy, they say, assesses world religions by a single criterion, their doctrine of salvation, ignoring wider issues such as, for example, their doctrine of God. In addition, the category ‘exclusivist’ is entirely negative and leaves no room for the fact that there may be some continuity between Christianity and other faiths (partly because they all grow from the same seed, and partly because of the influence of the Old Testament on all three ‘religions of the Book’, Judaism, Christianity and Islam).
Key chapter
The key chapter is the one on ‘The Triune God’, which clearly highlights the indivisibility of the Trinity and underlines the importance of this for any dialogue between Christianity and other faiths. This indivisibility is fatal to the Inclusivist idea that, though salvation is through Christ alone, he may be found in other religions. The underlying premise in such inclusivism is that the ministry of the Holy Spirit is wider than that of Christ and that the Spirit may therefore be working where Christ is not known. This radically separates God the Son from God the Spirit, whereas in the Christian Scriptures the Spirit’s mission is precisely to bear witness to Jesus as the only way to the Father.
Similarly, Inclusivism and Pluralism create a division between the work of Christ (the historical Jesus) and the work of the Eternal Word, arguing, again, that the Logos may be savingly active where Christ is not known and where people are completely ignorant of the supreme fact about the Logos, namely, that he became flesh and died for our sins. And linked to this is the division between the Son and the Father, as if the Father’s love could be known where the Son is not known.
The final chapter addresses the question of ‘Christian Witness in a Multi Religious World’. McDermott and Netland insist that there must be an unashamed proclamation of the kingdom of Christ, and at the same time they reject the idea that this kingdom is some this-worldly Utopia concerned only with the temporal well-being of humanity and with promoting such liberal concepts as love, justice and equality (and democracy). On the contrary, the kingdom is the universal reign of Jesus, claiming lordship over every human life.
Raising our hackles
This inevitably raises hackles. It is imperialistic, we are told, for Christianity to stand in judgment on other religions. But Evangelical theologians, believing that Christ is the definitive revelation of God, have no alternative but to judge other faiths in the light of that revelation. For them, a non-trinitarian God is a false God. Christian witness cannot be neutral, even in a multi religious world.
McDermott and Netland also address the claim that we must not conduct our witness with an ‘ulterior motive’: in other words, it must not have conversion as its aim. Of course, it is important that we listen as well as speak and treat the followers of other faiths as we would want to be treated ourselves. Equally, it is important to contextualise, sensitive to what may offend ‘religious others’ and alert to what we hold in common. But it is precisely where he speaks of becoming ‘all things to all men’ that the Apostle Paul adds, ‘that by all possible means I might save some’. The point of all Christian witness is to make disciples, just as it is the very nature of the gospel to call for decision. It is only when we pretend otherwise, as if we were interested only in talking for talking’s sake, that we become disingenuous.
Among the other issues addressed are whether there can be any real inter-religious dialogue where both sides are convinced of the truth of their own position, and what role apologetics should play in such dialogue.
Required reading
Some evangelicals may think this book too detached in its treatment of some scholars whose views appear simply outrageous. But it will do us no harm to be alerted to the fact that such views exist, and on the whole McDermott and Netland sustain a creditable level of rigorous, well-informed criticism. The result is a book which should be required reading for anyone involved in Christian mission in a multi religious world.
