What you consider an extreme weltanschaaung we consider to be an essential doctrine of Scripture. The Scriptures often divides people and doctrine into two classes, antithetically related. There are the sons of Cain and of Seth (Gen. 4-6), Israel and the nations (Ex. 19:5-6), the righteous and the wicked (Ps. 1), the wise and the foolish (Prov. 1:7), the saved and the lost (Matt. 18:11), the children of Abraham and those of the devil (John 8:39-44), the elect and the nonelect (Rom. 9), believers and unbelievers (1 Cor. 6:6), practitioners of the wisdom of the world and of the wisdom of God (1 Cor. 1-2), those who walk in light and those who walk in darkness (1 John 1:5-10), the church and the world (1 John 2:15-17).
A persons worldview is their basic hearts commitment that governs their life. The Scripture is clear that you either commit to Jesus and bring all thoughts captive to him (2 Cor 5:10) or your committed to something else, namely paganism. There is no neutrality. Liberal Christianity is, for instances, another religon because it denies all the basic doctrines of Christianity while trying to hold to the form. It is in essence pantheism. It is God manifesting and developing himself in successive stages of the finite either by means of ethical progression or even material progression, as in Darwinism.
Rome, otoh, is actually a synergism of Christianity and Paganism. While holding to the basic doctrines of Christianity it adds pagan symbolism to the mix. Where Pagan symbolism is mixed with the doctrines of God known only through his revelation there is always a watering down of that revelation. The great Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper described the antithesis with great clarity a century ago.
Now here is the very point at which the want of Symbolism announced itself. Every one who, moving in the finite, becomes aware of the existence of something Infinite, has to form a conception of the relation that exists between both. Here two possibilities present themselves. Either the Infinite reveals itself to man, and by this revelation unveils the really existing relation; or the Infinite remains mute and silent, and man himself has to guess, to conjecture, and to represent to himself this relation by means of his imagination; that is, in an artificial way. Now the first line is the Christian one. The Infinite at sundry times and in divers manners spoke in times past by the prophets, and in these late days has spoken to us by his Son—this Son being not a silent mystery, but the eternal, creating and speaking Word. Paganism, on the contrary, being destitute of revelation, wants the symbol, and creates it in its idols, “having mouths but they speak not, having ears but they hear not.” Symbol means a fictitious link between the invisible Infinite and the visible finite. It is derived from sumballein; i.e., bringing two different spheres together. Symbolism is the grasping of something outward and material, upon which the imagination may put the stamp of the unseen and unspeakable. The symbol is the middle link, being related from one side to what you can see and grasp, and from the other side to what you feel, fancy and imagine. As soon, therefore, as the consciousness of the Infinite revives in the public mind, in antagonism to a God-given Revelation, the demand for the symbol necessarily and immediately declares itself. So it was in the Grecian world, so it is now. Of course there exists also an unconscious, ever-changing relation between the Infinite and the finite in the actual phenomena of life; but this relation, being always partial, successive and momentarily gauged, cannot satisfy the soul. What she is longing after is a comprehensive impression of the Infinite in its totality, in its all-pervading and all-permeating action; and this sensation no finite phenomenon is able to stir in us, just because it is finite. What the soul want to realize is a grasping of the Infinite as such; and such an infinite sensation Symbolism only can produce, just because it puts an invisible stamp upon a visible or palpable phenomenon. In the Freemasonry you see quite the same thing. Freemasonry aims at the Infinite, but rejects all revelation, and therefore it created from the very first, and still advocates, the most explicit and elaborated symbolism. Spiritism, on the contrary, is almost choked with thirst for revelation from the other side of the tomb, and consequently knows of no symbolical fancy whatsoever.
So Revelation and Symbolism are opposed one to the other by principle. Both have in view to establish a perceivable relation between the Infinite and the finite, but they are so diametrically opposed, that by the means of Revelation it is the infinite Being himself who unveils and stipulates the relation to be accepted by the finite creature by faith: — and that, on the other hand, on the field of Symbolism, it is the finite man who conventionally coins such a relation symbolically, to be grasped not by faith, but by sensation. Now the fact that German pantheism rejects and repudiates every supernatural revelation, no one will deny. From the very beginning its war has been waged against every dogma, every confession, and every divine authority ascribed to the Holy Scriptures. The idea itself of a God intervening in the process of history was absolutely excluded; yea, even thrust out and debarred. According to the panta rei, the Infinite, strictly bound to the revealing of its essence in the course of successive events, could only throb and pulsate in the arteries of the cosmos and in man’s soul. But, besides that, it had to be silent and mute as the idol. In the all-embracing antithesis between Revelation and Symbolism, therefore, the current opinion of the day could not but antagonize Revelation and side with Symbolism. And here Philosophy and Art found their natural alliance—Philosophy, by its oneness of systematical conception, raising the mind to the Infinite, and Art, by the wonderful power of its imaginative gifts, creating the corresponding symbols.
Such is the bifurcation of the way of life at the approaching close of this century. There are two crossing tracks. Pointing to the orient, there is the old track of faith in a God-given Revelation, excluding every “will-worship.” But this old track now is crossed by the new road of Symbolism, boldly exhibiting the word: Will-worship on every guidepost till its end. And such an all-important fact as the thriving of such a cross-purpose antithesis cannot stop its diverging result within the holy precincts. It must lead necessarily to opposite conclusions and issues, both for our social and political, our moral and scientific views. A fact which becomes self-evident by the simple observation that Revelation reveals not only holy mysteries, but also proclaims irrevocable principles and immutable ordinances demanding obedience; and that, on the contrary, under the sway of Symbolism all principles are man’s own contrivances, and all moral ordinances self-made and conventional. The jurist in the symbolical camp does not hesitate publicly to declare that there is no right except that which is stated by the promulgated law, and that, therefore, what was right today becomes injustice tomorrow, as soon as that law is repealed.
No doubt, therefore, this all important and dominating antithesis should clearly have been caught by every student, and Symbolism at once antagonized by every Christian man, if in our actual life it had made its appearance in its absolute form. This, however, was nowhere the case at the rise of such a new tide. Even Freemasonry borrowed its symbols from the then existing church building corporations, and took care to hide its real meaning behind the mysterious curtain of successively higher degrees. So Symbolism always likes to unfold its full blossom only in its esoteric circle, and exoterically prefers the life of the parasite, stealthily entering its radicles into the delicate rind of the Christian stem. Accommodation to existing religion has always been its leading thought, and this accommodation it achieved at once by taking as poetry what the church confesses as the highest reality, by attaching to the holy history the alluring character of the legend and the myth, and finally by interpreting its actions of worship as mere symbolical utterances. I still remember how once I felt shocked by the church performances of a distinguished adherent of the new system, who in private conversation made no secret whatsoever to me of his absolute apostasy of the old Christian faith, and whom three days later I saw mounting the pulpit, solemnly reading what in the Book of the Kings is written about Elias’ miracles, and thereupon leading the collects of the common prayer. I confess frankly that I felt unable to explain such a bold contrast of personal conviction and outward performance. I thought it the essence of insincerity. But how greatly I was mistaken. “O, no, said he, there was no unfairness whatever. What do you think? Would it be unfair, if taking part in the play of your children, you performed, as earnestly as the little ones, the part of king which your boy had assigned you. What hypocrisy, then, could there be in one playing and singing with the children of God, as they call themselves, and of partaking in their worship? Of course if we ourselves considered all those performances as real, we could not join in them. But now, what, I ask you, could prevent us from enjoying your Christian high-styled poetry, or from ennobling our own feelings by partaking in your elaborate symbolics? Even the holy supper to me is a symbolical delicacy. It is these very church performances that unite the more childlike existence of the ordinary people with the more conscious and cultured life of the scientists.”
Hence the preference, which in the opinion of these modern symbolists, the Roman Catholic Church possesses above the Protestant, and among our various denominations the Episcopalian above the Presbyterian, in all its branches. Already in the first half of this century the so-called Romantic school in Germany led to the conversion of a great many famous Lutheran scholars and artists to the Church of Rome; and this can not surprise us. As with the solution of every vital problem, Rome’s strength lies in her compromise. Rome understood perfectly well the two different principles involved in the antithesis between Revelation and Symbolism, and avoiding, as always, every absolute choice, kept to the Revelation in her confession, but at the same time indulged in Symbolism for her worship. So Rome possesses an elaborate dogmatical system, but without troubling the mind of the people by it. The church thinks for the people, theirs is the “fides implicita” the implicit faith. In that “implicit faith” to adhere to the church is considered to be satisfactory for the laity. And thus the Revelation being secured, clergy and laity both are allowed to indulge in the most exquisite, most splendid, and most artistic symbolical worship. The impression of a high-mass performance in the Saint Peter's, or in the Cologne or Milan cathedral is indeed overpowering and overwhelming. But the shady side is obvious, and at the end of the middle ages, the lower as well as the higher class could witness, to what sad results both for the church and for society, this compromise between Revelation and Symbolism had led. I do not refer here to the abuse. From abuse every system has to suffer. I draw your attention merely to what, at the end of the middle ages, proved the downright consequence of the system itself. God’s holy Word almost ignored by the people. An overflow of mystical sensations darkening the mind. A general bluntness and dullness, rendering both the conscience and the consciousness dim and obtuse; and the distance between the lower and the higher classes wide and sharp. The laity overruled by the clergy. All vital energy broken. And the spirit of liberty and independence quite crushed down.
At that critical period God sent as a saving angel, what we all still shall honor as the Reformation, and this powerful reaction against Roman symbolism, partly checked in the Lutheran, and more so in the Episcopalian church, has been wrought out fully only along the Calvinistic line, in the non-conformist churches. These churches therefore took a fully opposite stand. Instead of relying upon feeling and sensation, they appealed to Faith, and faith here meant both the understanding of the Revelation and its personal application to the soul. They denied absolutely the necessity of connecting the Infinite with the finite by symbols. God had revealed himself, had revealed the mysteries of salvation, had revealed his ordinances for every sphere of our existence, and according to what Jesus declares, eternal life was not to have agreeable sensations, but “to know Thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” Not symbols but the “wisdom of God” was the preaching of the Cross. “I speak as to wise men, judge ye what I say,” interpreted the apostolic method of teaching, expounding not to the clergy alone, but to all the saints, the mysteries of justification and redemption. — Here, therefore, lies the fundamental difference between our old Calvinistic churches with their bold confession, and Rome with its compromise. Of course there is the mystical working of hidden potencies in our mind, there is the perception of God in the conscience, there is the emotion in prayer, and there is the communion with the indwelling Holy Spirit. But these are the mystical gifts, and the aim of God's Revelation is not to abandon us to shady and dim perceptions, but to declare to us the truth, to lift us up to its understanding, and so to enable the children of the kingdom of heaven to kindle the pure and serene light of the Gospel, to become confessors of a sound and clear confession, and if necessary to shed their martyr blood not for mystical sensations, but for the inviolability of God's Revelation. Hence the circulation of their Bible among all social classes; the well defined confessions, which they unfolded as their banners; the substantial Scriptural content of their preaching; their purified and simplified liturgy; and finally their submitting of every creature to God’s holy ordinances. So standing before the dilemma of feeling or faith, they choose for faith. Standing before the dilemma between sensation and understanding, they declared themselves distinctly for understanding. And as to the fundamental dilemma between Revelation given to us by God, and Symbolism conventionally coined by man, they firmly antagonized the symbolical system, and stood up for the all pervading authority of God’s holy Revelation. This was the nerve of their strength, and to this staunch defense of Revelation over against Symbolism, they owe their imperishable glory in history. For it was by thus decidedly turning the wheel of life, that the human mind was roused from its slumbers, that the hidden energies of humanity came forward, that the direct union of the soul with God was restored, and that the liberty of conscience, the liberty of worship, and as its immediate consequence, the social and political liberties, were reconquered for every nation, following in their track.
The remarks thus far suggested to your attention, I trust, fully elucidate my assertion, that the symbolical tide of our days is undermining in the most dangerous way the very foundation of all Calvinistic churches. The principle of Symbolism and that of Calvinism are just the reverse of one another. An abyss is gaping between them. Symbolism in the holy precincts stuns, blunts and stultifies the organs of understanding, and checks their function agnostically. Our churches, on the contrary, did not cease to pray, with St. Paul, and “to desire that all the people of God might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.” Symbolism throws us back to that lower stage of religious development, which could but stir the feelings and intoxicate the senses of the masses. Our churches, on the contrary, raised the religious life to that much higher level, which leads every believer personally to what St. John confessed, “that the Son of God has come and has given us the understanding that we might know him.” And so also Symbolism subjects the laity to the mysterious performances of the clergy and hereby fosters aristocratic sympathies. Our churches, on the contrary, united both laity and clergy in one brotherhood, and thereby laid the foundation for the democratic pre-eminence of modern times.
Let therefore no one retort, that whatsoever catastrophe may be menacing elsewhere, neither Ritualism, nor Symbolism proper, has thus far made any noticeable intrusion into our Calvinistic services. May the fact be beyond question. But do you not know, that no good arithmetician will cast up the positive figures only, leaving out the negative ones. Now, in our case the positive is the intrusion of sensual worship, but here is also the negative item, viz., the darkening of the understanding and the slipping in of confessional indifference. Symbolism always begins by silencing the voice of the confession, by instilling some slight aversion toward the dogma, so digging out the bed in which the glittering ritualistic stream is to flow. And now, as I am a foreigner here, you know your own churches better than I do. But are you sure, that this negative action of Symbolism is nowhere operating among you? Is the danger that the love for the banners which your fathers unfolded, be drowned in mere practical work and beautiful services a chimerical one? And if not, if really among you also the fervent attachment to the revealed Truth is abating, and to a certain amount a share of confessional indifference here also moistens already, and thickens the spiritual atmosphere, then let the watchman of Sion mount the belfry, for then the gate stands ajar, and Symbolism lies in wait in the trenches before it. As little as the sailor can conjure the gale that hunts his vessel, but by keeping to his helm, so little can you check this symbolical current, if you do not emphasize your own church principle. For such a current is an all-permeating elementary power, to be checked only by the equivalent power of your attachment to the revealed Truth. Let us not deceive ourselves. Philosophic Agnosticism, Rome’s “fides implicita,” Ritschl’s anti-dogmatical school, the new school of Sabbatier in Paris, Rome’s concealing of the Bible, as well as the dethroning of it by higher criticism, and so also the increasing confessional indifference, are all moving on the same line, and the terminus of that line is no other than sensual worship and dim symbolical adoration.
So yes, we will stick with the biblical antithesis and reject all forms of Paganism and relish only in God's revealed word.
"Symbolism throws us back to that lower stage of religious development, which could but stir the feelings and intoxicate the senses..."
That's a keeper.
I would hazard a guess and say no church is immune to it.
God bless
Really? I don't think aversion to dogma would justly characterize, say, the Lay Dominicans over the centuries.
I'll try to give a more nuanced response if I can make the time later today or tonight.
AMEN. The acquitted and the condemned. Great, glorious and merciful distinctions.
A person's worldview is their basic heart's commitment that governs their life. The Scripture is clear that you either commit to Jesus and bring all thoughts captive to him (2 Cor 5:10) or you're committed to something else, namely paganism. There is no neutrality. Liberal Christianity is, for instances, another religon because it denies all the basic doctrines of Christianity while trying to hold to the form. It is in essence pantheism. It is God manifesting and developing himself in successive stages of the finite either by means of ethical progression or even material progression, as in Darwinism.
Rome, otoh, is actually a synergism of Christianity and Paganism. While holding to the basic doctrines of Christianity it adds pagan symbolism to the mix. Where Pagan symbolism is mixed with the doctrines of God known only through his revelation there is always a watering down of that revelation. The great Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper described the antithesis with great clarity a century ago...
AMEN. "There is no neutrality."
I'm pinging a few others to your really, really excellent excerpt by Kuyper in your post #4634, and wondering what some of you think of it?
Wow. What a great line.
Accommodation to existing religion has always been its leading thought, and this accommodation it achieved at once by taking as poetry what the church confesses as the highest reality, by attaching to the holy history the alluring character of the legend and the myth, and finally by interpreting its actions of worship as mere symbolical utterances.
AMEN!
Hence the preference, which in the opinion of these modern symbolists, the Roman Catholic Church possesses above the Protestant, and among our various denominations the Episcopalian above the Presbyterian, in all its branches. Already in the first half of this century the so-called Romantic school in Germany led to the conversion of a great many famous Lutheran scholars and artists to the Church of Rome; and this can not surprise us. As with the solution of every vital problem, Rome's strength lies in her compromise. Rome understood perfectly well the two different principles involved in the antithesis between Revelation and Symbolism, and avoiding, as always, every absolute choice, kept to the Revelation in her confession, but at the same time indulged in Symbolism for her worship. So Rome possesses an elaborate dogmatical system, but without troubling the mind of the people by it. The church thinks for the people, theirs is the "fides implicita" the implicit faith. In that "implicit faith" to adhere to the church is considered to be satisfactory for the laity. And thus the Revelation being secured, clergy and laity both are allowed to indulge in the most exquisite, most splendid, and most artistic symbolical worship. The impression of a high-mass performance in the Saint Peter's, or in the Cologne or Milan cathedral is indeed overpowering and overwhelming. But the shady side is obvious, and at the end of the middle ages, the lower as well as the higher class could witness, to what sad results both for the church and for society, this compromise between Revelation and Symbolism had led. I do not refer here to the abuse. From abuse every system has to suffer. I draw your attention merely to what, at the end of the middle ages, proved the downright consequence of the system itself. God's holy Word almost ignored by the people. An overflow of mystical sensations darkening the mind. A general bluntness and dullness, rendering both the conscience and the consciousness dim and obtuse; and the distance between the lower and the higher classes wide and sharp. The laity overruled by the clergy. All vital energy broken. And the spirit of liberty and independence quite crushed down...
At that critical period God sent as a saving angel, what we all still shall honor as the Reformation, and this powerful reaction against Roman symbolism, partly checked in the Lutheran, and more so in the Episcopalian church, has been wrought out fully only along the Calvinistic line, in the non-conformist churches. These churches therefore took a fully opposite stand. Instead of relying upon feeling and sensation, they appealed to Faith, and faith here meant both the understanding of the Revelation and its personal application to the soul. They denied absolutely the necessity of connecting the Infinite with the finite by symbols. God had revealed himself, had revealed the mysteries of salvation, had revealed his ordinances for every sphere of our existence, and according to what Jesus declares, eternal life was not to have agreeable sensations, but "to know Thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." Not symbols but the "wisdom of God" was the preaching of the Cross. "I speak as to wise men, judge ye what I say," interpreted the apostolic method of teaching, expounding not to the clergy alone, but to all the saints, the mysteries of justification and redemption. — Here, therefore, lies the fundamental difference between our old Calvinistic churches with their bold confession, and Rome with its compromise. Of course there is the mystical working of hidden potencies in our mind, there is the perception of God in the conscience, there is the emotion in prayer, and there is the communion with the indwelling Holy Spirit. But these are the mystical gifts, and the aim of God's Revelation is not to abandon us to shady and dim perceptions, but to declare to us the truth, to lift us up to its understanding, and so to enable the children of the kingdom of heaven to kindle the pure and serene light of the Gospel, to become confessors of a sound and clear confession, and if necessary to shed their martyr blood not for mystical sensations, but for the inviolability of God's Revelation. Hence the circulation of their Bible among all social classes; the well defined confessions, which they unfolded as their banners; the substantial Scriptural content of their preaching; their purified and simplified liturgy; and finally their submitting of every creature to God's holy ordinances. So standing before the dilemma of feeling or faith, they choose for faith. Standing before the dilemma between sensation and understanding, they declared themselves distinctly for understanding. And as to the fundamental dilemma between Revelation given to us by God, and Symbolism conventionally coined by man, they firmly antagonized the symbolical system, and stood up for the all pervading authority of God's holy Revelation. This was the nerve of their strength, and to this staunch defense of Revelation over against Symbolism, they owe their imperishable glory in history. For it was by thus decidedly turning the wheel of life, that the human mind was roused from its slumbers, that the hidden energies of humanity came forward, that the direct union of the soul with God was restored, and that the liberty of conscience, the liberty of worship, and as its immediate consequence, the social and political liberties, were reconquered for every nation, following in their track...
AMEN!!! Sorry for these long excerpts from the post, but every word of this is joyous and confirms the power and the intent and the accomplishment of the Holy Spirit.
Symbolism in the holy precincts stuns, blunts and stultifies the organs of understanding, and checks their function agnostically. Our churches, on the contrary, did not cease to pray, with St. Paul, and "to desire that all the people of God might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding."
Symbolism throws us back to that lower stage of religious development, which could but stir the feelings and intoxicate the senses of the masses. Our churches, on the contrary, raised the religious life to that much higher level, which leads every believer personally to what St. John confessed, "that the Son of God has come and has given us the understanding that we might know him." And so also Symbolism subjects the laity to the mysterious performances of the clergy and hereby fosters aristocratic sympathies. Our churches, on the contrary, united both laity and clergy in one brotherhood, and thereby laid the foundation for the democratic pre-eminence of modern times.
AMEN! A foundation without peer.
But I have a problem with it right at the beginning. I am talking about what seem to me to be artificial oppositions in the works of God, and you come back with real distinctions among classes of people. I am not arguing that there are NO distinctions and no oppositions (though it may be apposite to mention that Satan is not the polar opposite of God, but of Michael).
And here we go:
Symbol means a fictitious link between the invisible Infinite and the visible finite. It is derived from sumballein; i.e., bringing two different spheres together.[emphasis, duh]
If we start out by postulating that symbolism is fictitious, we must not be surprised if we end up concluding it is fictitious. But we must not be persuaded either.
What the soul want to realize is a grasping of the Infinite as such; and such an infinite sensation Symbolism only can produce, just because it puts an invisible stamp upon a visible or palpable phenomenon.
If I accept "symbolism" as an apt word to describe what we do (and I'm a little dodgy on that. Does he mean to be referring to the Sacraments or what? ) then I disagree with Dr. Kuyper on what symbolism is capable of or useful for or something like that. I don't think it so much lets me grasp ("produce"s "a grasping of the Infinite") as heightens and focusses my longing.
[And what does he mean by "Spiritism"? I'm not sure what he's saying there.)
Darn. I have to say, with frustration, that to me his second paragrpah illustrates precisely the artificiality of the dichotomies I'm trying to comprehend. There was a time when revelation was tactile, undeniably "sensible". A man crouched doodling in the sand, a touched hem of a garment -- these are all sensible.
The left hand and the right are also "opposed one to another by principle", by the principle of "handedness". But they still work together.
Further, I'm not sure the opposition of symbol and revelation is not a straw man. That is, I don't look to the Veneration of the Cross (which I'm thinking might qualify as a symbol) for Doctrine, or for "discursive" apprehension of Divine Truth. In fact, I consider that symbolic activity a response to revelation, not a bearer of it. It MIGHT conceivably, but not essentially, be an occasion of revelation.
(How very sort of Romantic post-Hegelian he is! Interesting guy!)
Paragraph 3 of this passage ("Such is the bifurcation") gives me pause. I mean I get the "history of Philosophy" thing. I was quite the Hegelian for a year or so there back in, say 1970 and into '71 (then God tapped me on the shoulder with a sledge hammer ...) But I don't get how, in the history of Xty the end of the 1800's and the beginning of the 1900's was a particular bifurcation. But wow, do I share his horror (paragraph 4: "No doubt...") at the "distinguished adherent of the new system"! Self-congratulatory gnosticism rears its raddled head.
Paragraph 5, "hence the preference": Okay. NOW we get to Rome. I see. The argument so far amounts to, "Because symbolists like Roman type worship, therefore Rome is wrong." So as a place marker I have to put in: because right wing wackos like those guys who protest at funerals call themselves "Baptists" May I conclude something negative about the Baptist strand??
"Rome's strength lies in her compromise". "avoiding, as always, every absolute choice,". Eveery one? The last Western Church with an official body capable of giving an official stand and taking uncompromising stands on Artificial Birth Control and Abortion is avoiding every absolute choice? BEfore this is written The IMmaculate Conception is defined and after the Assumption is defined, and we are told we are avoiding EVERY absolute choice?
We may be avoiding HIS choice between what HE calls Symbolism and Revelation, a distinction which, as I pointed out earlier, seems to overlook the Incarnation, but "every absolute choice" indicates to me that his urge to find Rome wrong has over-ridden his judgment.
It is unrealistic to take the magnificent worship at St. Peter's or at the great European Cathedrals as usual or typical. The guy is taking an extreme and putting it forth as common. He hears, maybe even witnesses the magnificent ceremonial, and overlooks the significance of the weary, distracted priest and the slack-jawed, snot-nosed altar boy mumbling Mass responses before a gaggle of dowagers in some neglected side-chapel. The simple daily said Mass, the usual, is overlook in favor of the rare and magnificent, and on this carelss approach to data an indictment is laid. No sale.
And as he cherry-picks his liturgical data, he also cherry picks his temporal sample. The Laity, such wimps and wussies as Catherine of Sienna, beaten down and uncaring? Maybe in the early 16th century, and maybe when he was writing (though I doubt it) but ..
Well, all I have is my experience of a parish with several different adult classes going on at once, both Bible-study and Theology - for teens through seniors (I take Sunday School for the kiddies as stipulated), lay-organized devotions -- heck, a Lay Dominican taught a really fine, the Bible for beginners class last Fall. Not bad at all.
In my previous parish of around 40-60 Sunday attendance I had a weekly Bible class with 6-10 people every Sunday. I read that from BEFORE Vatican II reading the Bible was an indulgenced activity.
Further, back to "sampling". One of the amusing things I've noticed about US Zen Buddhists is that they compare the Sunday of their childhood to the stories of Zen Masters and the intense atmosphere of the Zendo during a retreat. They don't realize how very unrepresentative the anecdotes and the sesshin are.
Here Dr. (as I presume him to be) Kuyper compares the Catholics her may have observed from a distance and know about by reputation to... to what? To every person attending a reform church on a drowsy summer Sunday, listening to an interminable sermon of indeterminate point? To Tom Sawyer's church? Or to the church where he or his colleagues are preaching and where the presumably intelligent and committed members stay after for coffee and conversation or invite him to their homes.
As I like to say, always remember that 100 IQ is average! A cleric is not always in position to evaluate his own congregation, because those who are bored, half-hearted, uncommitted, etc. don't cluster around him. It's the opposite of the US college student and Zen. Dr. Kuyper, presumably not speaking at a small church outside Moline IL late on a July morning, but rather at a large and exciting parish, maybe at a lecture where the audience is self-selected for interest or to students who, more or less, have chosen his classes and must do the homework, concludes from his rewarding experience that Reform Churches are just more involved, more full of vitality than the oppressed Catholic laity.
But his experience of Catholics is derived from an entirely different type of population and a different set of anecdotes. I had the good fortune to take part in a sparkling discussion of what it means to say that Jesus "did all things well" -- not ONE priest in sight, not ONE -- and we ranged over the virtues, especially temperance, and the disordered affections and impulses of fallen man as indicated in music and literature and as addressed in prayer and the study of Scripture and the Fathers. Dr. Kuyper would have us believe that all the laity are crushed and ignorant and kept so by their clergy, and expects us to think that there are no members of reform churches with 100 or lower IQs and ADHD and disordered lives, and then wants that comparison to demonstrate something about Catholics, Symbolism and Revelation? It won't do. It doesn't describe the Devotio Moderna of the Late Middle Ages and other lay movements.
TO sum up. Thank you for presenting this articulation of the difference. It is very interesting, and despite some of what strike me as errors, there's no question that Kuyper is a thoughtful and pious guy. I do think that there is a common urge among religious thinkers to present a category of deviation or error which will explain the broad way which leads away from the Truth. As such, the passage is more a description of a point of view than an argument as such. And, IMHO, it indicates that the POV is, in part, based on a common error of what I'm calling "sampling". For that and other reasons, this passage, although it does give me something to think about, does not pose a challenge to me (on the always dubious assumption that I understood it, that is.)
Thanks again. I hope I was responsive (and I wish I got paid by the hour ...)
Where do we find that part in the Bible,Dear Brother?
....Or should I say where do you twist the Scriptures to make this fit?
“”Symbolism is the grasping of something outward and material, upon which the imagination may put the stamp of the unseen and unspeakable””
I'll bet you have no problem with the pagan goddess lady liberty in NY harbor though?
Better throw away pictures of loved ones too!
We can trace back veneration of relics and symbols to the earliest of Christians,like the ones who admired the life of Saint Polycarp-who was a Disciple of Saint John. They even brought the bones in as reminders
“We took up his bones, which are more valuable than precious stones and finer than refined gold, and laid them in a suitable place, where the Lord will permit us to gather ourselves together, as we are able, in gladness and joy and to celebrate the birthday of his martyrdom.”
(The Martyrdom of Polycarp, dated to about 150 AD.)
Saint Jerome also wrote..
“We do not worship, we do not adore, for fear that we should bow down to the creature rather than to the creator, but we venerate the relics of the martyrs in order the better to adore him whose martyrs they are. (Ad Riparium, XXII)”
And you trusted This Blessed Saint during Bible Canon. Correct?
From Kuyper “”nor Symbolism proper, has thus far made any noticeable intrusion into our Calvinistic services.””
Right on target!
Instead they replace Christian services with the words “calvinistic services “.
It is the mind of John Calvin that gets the worship.
Perhaps Calvin should have read more Saint Augustine,since he used other writings from the Blessed Saint.
From Saint Augustine..
“If a father's coat or ring, or anything else of that kind, is so much more cherished by his children, as love for one's parents is greater, in no way are the bodies themselves to be despised, which are much more intimately and closely united to us than any garment; for they belong to man's very nature.” It is clear from this that he who has a certain affection for anyone, venerates whatever of his is left after his death, not only his body and the parts thereof, but even external things, such as his clothes, and such like. Now it is manifest that we should show honor to the saints of God, as being members of Christ, the children and friends of God, and our intercessors.” Saint Augustine(De Civ. Dei i, 13
Outstanding post, TC! :) Right now I'm studying Francis Schaeffer and this is straight from his playbook. Or, Schaeffer is straight from Kuyper's playbook. :) Kuyper clearly understood who the infinite-personal God is, and that He is THERE, and He is not silent. :)
It absolutely is an antithesis, but with symbolism there really aren't any absolutes. Bye-bye antithesis. Only under the system of symbolism (nothingness) can man claim to reign supreme.