Anti-revolutionary doctrine of scripture

Hans Burger
Neo-Calvinism and the French Revolution (2nd European Conference on Neo-Calvinism),
Parijs 23 augustus 2012

1. Introduction

Theologians, critical of modernity, often also tend to be critical of foundationalism.

According to foundationalism, propositions with the status of ‘knowledge’ are (1) self-evident
to reason and can function as foundation of our knowledge, or (2) justified by a foundational
proposition. Rational knowledge must be based on a solid and firm foundation.1 The
evocative metaphor of a house with a solid foundation is vivid and influential, as our
languages demonstrate. Central to foundationalism is the epistemological quest for absolute
certainty. The reverse side of this quest for certainty is the so called ‘Cartesian anxiety’ that
sees only two alternatives: we find an objective and solid foundation for our knowledge, or
the danger of relativism and subjectivism looms.2
When theology followed the strategy of foundationalism in the period of Modernity, it
had the choice to take the Scriptures as its epistemological foundation, or religious experience,
or an infallible pope.3 Nowadays, however, alternatives are developed due to criticism of
foundationalism. This might lead to a change of position for the doctrine of Scripture in

1
G. van den Brink, Almighty God. A Study of the Doctrine of the Omnipotence of God (Studies in Philosophical
Theology 7), (Kampen: Kok Pharos Publishing House 1993) 11-13; C.E. Gunton, The One, the Three and the
Many. God, Creation and the Culture of Modernity (Cambridge: Cambridge Univesity Press 1998), 132; J.
Hoogland, ‘Orthodoxie, moderniteit en postmoderniteit’, in: G. van den Brink e.a., Filosofie en theologie. Een
gesprek tussen christen-filosofen en theologen (Amsterdam: Buijten en Schipperheijn 1997), 135-136; M. Sarot,
‘Christian Fundamentalism as a Reaction to the Enlightenment’, in: B. Becking (ed.), Orthodoxy, Liberalism,
and Adaptation: Essays on Ways of Worldmaking in Times of Change from Biblical, Historical and Systematic
Perspectives (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 259-261; B. van den Toren, Breuk en brug. In gesprek met Karl Barth over
postmoderne theologie en geloofsverantwoording (Zoetermeer: Boekencentrum 1995), 56-59; N. Wolterstorff,
Reason within the Bounds of Religion (2nd Edition), (Grand Rapids MI: Eerdmans 1999), 28-30.
2
The term ‘Cartesian anxiety’ comes from R. J. Bernstein, Beyond Objectivism and Relativism: Science,
Hermeneutics, and Praxis, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press 1983).
3
Nancey Murphy shows both possibilities: conservative foundationalism that took the Scriptures as foundation,
or liberal foundationalism focussing on religious experience. See N. Murphy, Beyond Liberalism &
Fundamentalism. How Modern and Postmodern Theology set the Theological Agenda, (Valley Forge PA:
Trinity Press International 1996), 4-28. Sarot interprets both the defence of the inerrancy of Scripture and the
proclamation of the infallibility of the pope in 1870 as consequences of a foundationalist strategy, see M. Sarot,
‘Christian Fundamentalism as a Reaction to the Enlightenment’.
See further on conservative foundationalism Van den Brink, Almighty God, 13-14; J. Hoogland, ‘Orthodoxie,
moderniteit en postmoderniteit’, 135-136; E. van Staalduine-Sulman, ‘The Evangelical Movement and the
Enlightment’, in C. van der Kooi etc., Evangelical Theology in Transition (Amsterdam: VU University Press
2012), 54-55; N. Wolterstorff, Reason within the Bounds of Religion, 58-62. On the development of the views on
Scripture from Calvin to Warfield and Bavinck, see H. van den Belt, The Authority of Scripture in Reformed
Theology: Truth and Trust (Leiden : Brill 2008); on Neo-Calvinist views of Scripture see K. van Bekkum,
‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag in Neo-Calvinistische visies op de historiciteit van de Bijbel’, in K. van Bekkum and
R. Rouw (Eds.), Geloven in zekerheid? Gereformeerd geloven in een postmoderne tijd, (Barneveld: De
Vuurbaak 2000), 77-108.
reformed systematic theology. The doctrine of Scripture is e.g. made part of the doctrine of
the means of grace or of the doctrine of the church. 4
However, according to Abraham Kuyper in his rectorial address The biblical criticism
of the present day, doing so would be a symptom of ‘the revolution in theology’5. He writes:

Encyclopedically this was most sharply declared in the claim that the locus de S.
Scriptura should be removed from the gable of dogmatics, and be given a place in the
transept of the media gratiae.6

In Kuyper’s view, a ‘philosophical revolution-principle’7 was working in theology and

especially in the doctrine of scripture and in biblical criticism.
In this paper I will investigate this rectorial address, searching for an answer to the following
questions:
- What did Kuyper mean by this ‘philosophical revolution-principle’?
- What did Kuyper propose as an alternative?
- In which sense was this alternative anti-revolutionary and anti-modern, and in which sense
was it modern itself? Was it foundationalist?
- What does this imply for the location of the doctrine of scripture in systematic theology?

2. Revolution in theology

Most characteristic for Kuyper’s view of the spirit of revolution, is that it ‘has transposed the
entire human consciousness in every department of life’.8 For theology, this implies that
God’s Word spoken from ‘God's own self-consciousness’9 is no longer the source of
knowledge of God, but the human consciousness of God. Conscious knowledge of God

4
See e.g. A. van de Beek, Lichaam en Geest van Christus. De theologie van de kerk en de Heilige Geest,
(Zoetermeer: Meinema 2012), 275-338; G. van den Brink, C. van der Kooi, Christelijke dogmatiek. Een
inleiding, (Zoetermeer:Boekencentrum 2012), 483-516; B. Kamphuis, ‘Systematische Theologie’, in: A.L.Th. de
Bruijne (red.),Gereformeerde theologie vandaag: oriëntatie en verantwoording (TU-Bezinningsreeks nr. 4),
(Barneveld: De Vuurbaak 2004), 66.
5
A. Kuyper, The Biblical criticism of the present day (translated by J.H. de Vries)
http://ia600307.us.archive.org/13/items/biblicalcriticis00kuyp/biblicalcriticis00kuyp.pdf (2012 10 04), 415.
See on the historical background of this rectorial address C. Augustijn, ‘Kuypers rede over ‘De hedendaagsche
schriftcritiek’ in haar historische context’, in: C. Augustijn en J. Vree, Abraham Kuyper: vast en veranderlijk
(Zoetermeer: Meinema 1998), 109-148.
On its theological importance, see H. Berkhof, ‘Neocalvinistische theologie van Kuyper tot Kuitert’, in K.U.
Gäbler etc. (eds.), Geloof dat te denken geeft. Optellen aangeboden aan prof. Dr. H.M. Kuitert (Baarn: Ten Have
1989), 32-34; Van Bekkum, ‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag’, 94-96; J. Veenhof, ‘Honderd jaar theologie aan de
Vrije Universiteit’, in: M. van Os, W.J. Wieringa (Eds,), Wetenschap en rekenschap 1880-1980. Een eeuw
wetenschapsbeoefening aan de Vrije Universiteit (Kampen: Kok 1980), 50-51.
More general on Kuyper’s doctrine of Scripture D. van Keulen, ‘The Internal Tension in Kuyper’s Doctrine of
Organic Inspiration of Scripture’, in: C. van der Kooi, Jan de Bruin (Eds.) Kuyper Reconsidered. Aspects of his
Life and Work, (Amsterdam: VU Uitgeverij 1999), 123-130; D. van Keulen, Bijbel en dogmatiek.
Schriftbeschouwing en schriftgebruik in het dogmatisch werk van A. Kuyper, H. Bavinck en G.C. Berkouwer
(Kampen: Kok 2003), 20-67.
6
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 415.
7
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 417.
8
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 415.
9
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 416.
springs ‘from the unconscious mystery of the soul’,10 by ‘impressions on the conscience, or
impulses of feeling’, or ‘by the inoculation of a lymph of life’.11
This transposition has consequences for one’s view of the Bible and of inspiration.
‘[T]he Holy Scripture as a book of divine authority’12 is abolished and a difference no longer
exists between inspiration and illumination. Kuyper refers to the German theologian Richard
Rothe (1799-1867). According to Rothe, the Holy Spirit may elevate human sinful life as he
did in the writers of the Bible, ‘which made their consciousness of God more clear, and from
this brightened consciousness of God they were able to produce rich and new thoughts.’13 But
Rothe

held that there can be no mention of an infallibility of Scripture ; that most of the
writers, but never the Scripture itself, can be called inspired ; that inspiration differs
greatly in degree among the writers severally; and that therefore the explanation given
by the apostles of the Scripture of the Old Covenant often seems to him incorrect; that
their representation of Christian truth cannot be taken to be normative for us per se;
and that, which is especially noteworthy, even the image, the picture, given us
of the Christ is not of itself possessed of a guarantee of being a faithful reproduction.14

As a result of this view of knowledge of God,

you have no right to value your perceptions as being essentially higher than ours : they
do not differ specifically, but at most only in degree of development ; in the religious
life also there is a Darwinistic process. And thus the wall of separation between the
holy and the profane fell away; the chasm between the sacred and the common was
filled in; idolatries were not taken as the religions of the nations; and, together with the
sacred writings of other people, the sacred books of Israel were tested by the
touchstone of all profane literature.15

Theology is changed into ‘science of religion’ without any clear, absolute, normative
knowledge of God.
Summarizing, the revolution in theology is a shift from God’s consciousness to the
human religious consciousness, from the Word of God as principium theologiae to the human
religiosity as source of knowledge of God, from a view of the Word of God as inspired by the
Holy Spirit to the result of religious impressions of pious men, and from theology to religious
studies.

Kuyper pictures the consequences of this shift in dramatic language. He compares the detailed
historical critical analysis of the Bible to ‘microscopical analysis’ without ‘holy synthesis’16,
or to ‘vivisection’, forbidden when the human body is concerned but allowed as biblical

10
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 416.
11
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 417.
12
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 433.
13
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 437.
14
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 437.
15
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 418-419
16
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 414.
criticism.17 He formulates his speech as one big complaint against the modern and ethical
theologians of his age. According to Kuyper, ‘to be ethical of tendency and clear seem never
capable of going hand in hand.’18 They leave the church with a theology that is no longer
theology. How can young men who have studied this theology start working as ministers in
the church? Kuyper writes:

You offer her a science which has no connection with her confession, and you send
her pastors who, how ever learned and reverend, if in other ways they are serious,
must confess shamefacedly their ignorance of the things of the Spirit, and, instead of
feeding the church, must needs be fed and warmed by her. And so it is no wonder, that
diseases in the church are on the increase hand over hand, that sects are multiplying,
that practice does not follow the teaching, and that " shepherd and flock," distrustful of
each other, stand mutually opposed, instead of unitedly enjoying the glory of Jesus'
name. Even society at large, yes the country, suffers by it. For a spiritual circle which
finds its image in a marsh, instead of in a clear lake, throws out of necessity poisonous
vapors, which spoil the national spirit. By robbing the church of her theology, she is
robbed also of that wonderful power of thought which made us Calvinists for ages
together an invincible stronghold in the midst of the land; and, by presenting
wandering ethical ideas in the stead of the nourishing bread of practical theology,
discipline and order are undermined, and the moral sense of justice is weakened.19

Even nationalist feelings are mobilized to support his argument. Calvinists made Holland a
free nation, this revolutionary spirit however demolishes the free and strong spirit of Dutch
Calvinism. ‘As a free-born son of a nation which purchased its liberty from Spain’,20 Kuyper
argues, he has to protest against this vivisection of Scripture.

3. Kuyper’s Alternative

In another passage we start to discover what Kuyper is in search of. He wants to let flourish a
strong Christian life, born out of a deep conviction. He writes:

For to obtain real peace, an unshakable faith, and a full development of powers, our
soul must, in the depth of depths and forsaken of all men, depend on God Almighty
alone. To draw one's being immediately from God's own hand, consciously and
continuously, this renders one invincible, enables one to become heroic, and makes us
surpass ourselves. This was the secret of the power by which Calvinism once
astonished the world. That forms character, steels the will with energy, and sets man,
the citizen, the confessor of Jesus, truly free.21

17
Most explicitly Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 666-667; and further 413, 420, 677, 685, 686.
18
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 434.
19
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 420-421.
20
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 686.
Veenhof mentions that according to Kuyper, the decline of theology in the Netherlands was caused by foreign
(German) influences, see Veenhof, ‘Honderd jaar theologie aan de Vrije Universiteit’, 46.
21
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 678.
Here we discover two central motives of Kuyper’s own position: dependency on God alone22
and an unshakable faith.23
The first motive of dependency on God alone has a clear anti-modern direction,
against the modern disappearance from the scene of God’s activity in the world.24 Kuyper´s
prayer at the beginning of his address exemplifies this motive:
And may He, before whose glory I reverently bow and for the welfare of whose
church I plead, be in this the inspirer of my word and the judge of my thoughts ; while
in this sacred task, also, our help is in the name of the Lord Jehovah, the Rock of our
strength, and the Strength of our life.25
Kuyper not only presents himself as a strong Dutch Calvinist, but also as a pious simple ‘day-
laborer’ who is addressed personally by ‘the Lord my God’ when he reads the Bible.26 He is
one ‘with the simple-minded people of God confessing my ignorance’27 while feeling ‘the "
zeal of God " come over me’28.
The dependency of God and especially of God’s Spirit returns again and again. It
comprises the entire movement from God’s conscious self-knowledge (theologia archetypa)
via revelation, inspiration, regeneration and illumination to human conscious knowledge of
God (theologia ectypa) as a result of the reading and interpretation of Scripture. Kuyper
writes:

In anthropology, man is the centrum, and the Almighty is considered only as the
interpretation of the religious sense ; but in theology God himself is the centrum, and
no mention of man is justified, except in so far as God uses him for his own sake.
Again, in all other sciences man observes and thoughtfully investigates the
object, and subjects it to himself, but in theology the object itself is active ; it does not
stand open, but gives itself to be seen ; does not allow itself to be investigated, but
reveals itself; and employs thinking man as instrument only to cause the knowledge of
his Being to radiate. …
And, finally, theology is not born, like other sciences, from the motive of need
or from the impulse after knowledge, but from the impulsion of the Holy Spirit. In
giving us a theology, God has a purpose to fulfill. He wills that the knowledge of his
Being shall be received by us ; and that, having been cast into the furrows of our
minds and hearts, it shall germinate; and, having germinated, that it shall bear fruit to
the honor of his name.29

Here we see the experience of faith function as one of Kuyper’s starting points, although Augustijn denies this is
the case. See Augustijn, ‘Kuypers rede’, 119. The same is the case when Kuyper starts his second part and tells
how he reads the Bible together with the other members of the congregations, see Kuyper, Biblical criticism,
422-425.
22
Cf. W. van der Schee, ‘Kuyper’s Archimedes’ Point’, in: Kuyper Reconsidered, 102-110.
23
Van Keulen, ‘The Internal Tension’, 129-130; Van Keulen, Bijbel en dogmatiek, 31-33, 43-44, 61-62;
24
Cf. Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 673: ‘The " wisdom of the world " constantly seeks to reduce the immediate
work of God in history to ever smaller dimensions, and cannot rest until the factor " God " has entirely
disappeared from the same.’
25
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 410.
26
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 422.
27
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 676.
28
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 677.
29
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 411; cf 669.
The Bible as book as such is not especially valuable. Only in relation with God, when the
Holy Spirit casts his light of illumination on it, becomes Scripture precious. Kuyper compares
this to a beautiful diamond which is seen in its beauty only if light is shining on it. Further,
although he writes the image is profane, he nevertheless uses the image of a telephone,
suggesting that through the book God is speaking as someone speaks from a distance through
the telephone.30
In opposition to the active knowing subject of modernity, Kuyper places God who
makes himself known to human beings.31

This knowledge of God is the central element in Kuypers view of an unshakable faith, his
second motive. In his emphasis on absolute, determinate, certain knowledge, Kuyper follows
modernity’s foundationalist quest by focussing on epistemological questions.
Foundationalism approaches scientific knowledge by using the model of a building,
built on a solid foundation of absolute certain propositions. This influence is not so much
evidenced by his use of foundational imagery: only twice Kuyper refers to theology as a
building.32 Significant however is the foundational twist Kuyper gives to the image of a rock
in a passionate passage dealing with human anxiety and thirst after certainty. Whereas in the
Bible the image of a rock is used personally referring to God as a rock, Kuyper uses the image
of a rock referring to the Scriptures.

Thus a conflict is waged as of giant-forces in his breast, and that oppresses him ; he
sees no way of escape ; he faints beneath its tension, except He who is compassionate
takes compassion on him, and sets him up upon the Rock of the Word. Only when he
stands on that Word, does the oil of gladness drip in his soul instead of mourning, and
the garments of praise begin to shine forth in place of the spirit of heaviness, and the
man breaks forth in singing the praises of Him who has set him free from bonds; also
from those oppressing bonds of dependency upon man, who at best is but a creature of
dust. 33

Moreover, the central core of his address is his defence of the Scriptures as a firm foundation
for absolute, certain knowledge of God. Kuyper makes a comparison between the Scriptures
and God’s creation:

It is a mystery of love and comfort which can be explained only when each and every
writer, whose inestimable grace and honor it was to record a larger or smaller part of
that Scripture, was not his own master in the writing, but only rendered service as an
instrument of the Holy Ghost, and was so wrought upon and directed by the Holy
Ghost, that the page of Scripture, which, after pencil and pen had been laid aside, lay

30
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 424.
In 1894 Kuyper uses the telephone-metaphor again but now without mentioning its profanity, see A. Kuyper,
Encyclopedia of sacred theology; its principles (New York: C. Scribner's Sons 1898),
http://archive.org/stream/cu31924029192115#page/n7/mode/2up (2012 10 04), 364.
31
Cf. Veenhof, ‘Honderd jaar theologie aan de Vrije Universiteit’, 49-50.
32
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 411, 669.
In his Encyclopedia, Kuyper does use the foundational imagery, see Kuyper, Encyclopedia, 155-156, 161, 164.
33
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 678.
 before him, contained and was possessed of equal fixedness, as though it had
originated by an immediate, divine creation.34

Kuyper does not claim the inerrancy of Scripture. Nevertheless, he writes ‘it would be
presumptuous and disrespectful’ to exclude that the autographs were infallible. Possibly the
autographs were written without error. In any case, we cannot exclude they were faultless.35
Further, the rhetorical structure of his argument evidences that absolute certain
knowledge is at the heart of his address. In the first encyclopaedic part Kuyper safeguards that
theological knowledge is built on determinate communication of truth from God’s self-
consciousness by God himself in a form appropriate to our consciousness. The second step of
Kuyper’s argument consists in his exposition of his doctrine of inspiration of Scripture.
Kuyper’s aim is to defend that God spoke ‘with indeclinable certainty in the. highest form, viz.
in that of the Conscious Word’.36 After the explanation of inspiration, Kuyper concludes:

Hence the result is, that, apart from the question whether the writers realize it or not,
by them as instruments a book or song or epistle was written, which in its original
form, i. e,. as autographon, bare in itself the infallible authority of having been
wrought by the Holy Ghost.

According to Kuyper, the central issue is whether ‘the fact of inspiration remains untouched
and its result immovable’. Again we see the centrality of the motive of certain knowledge.
He writes:

The divine fixedness over against the uncertainty of all human ponderings, is chiefly
that which makes the Holy Scripture " holy," i. e. a bible for the church of God.37

The important question in studying the Scripture is

only and exclusively whether it leaves us in the possession of such an inspiration of

the Scripture, whose result offers us for its entire content the unweakened guarantee of
divine certainty. 38

Kuyper continues with a critical discussion of modern and ethical theology. Here again his
focus is on the defence of Scripture as a foundation. He states very clearly a diametrical
antithesis between the spirit of the world and the philosophy of our age on the one hand, and
the Spirit of God on the other hand. The spirit of this world bends ‘its energies toward the
breakingdown of the authority of the Scripture’.39 He concludes his discussion with his
diagnosis of the spiritual impulse of his age ‘to transpose in every way the "Deushomo " into
the "Homo-deus,"’, a ‘humanizing of the Scriptures’.40

34
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 426-427; cf 425. See more general on Kuyper’s doctrine of inspiration Van Keulen,
Bijbel en dogmatiek, 28-36.
35
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 671.
36
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 425.
37
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 433.
38
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 433.
39
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 668.
40
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 674-675.
 He then finishes his treatment of inspiration with a short first discussion of several
problems that might threaten this divine certainty. However, the introduction of this
discussion is significant:
That, after the subtraction of all this, there still remain serious objections at several
points to the absoluteness of the inspiration of the Scripture, we neither deny nor hide,
even though one readily sees to what small dimensions this mountain of
insurmountable obstacles has already fallen away.41
Then follows the third part which starts with the most passionate defense of our human need
of absolute certainty. ‘A troubled soul, tossed with tempest and not comforted, is filled with
anxiety, and thirsts after certainty.’42 But immediately from God’s hand we receive the life
that ‘renders one invincible, enables one to become heroic, and makes us surpass ourselves.’43
Now Kuyper discusses again the problems that threaten the absolute certainty: the
number of books in the canon, the errors in the received text of Scripture, the fact that we
mostly need a translation, and the problem of interpretation. These four problems constitute a
serious threat to the foundationalist model. They question the absoluteness of the foundation,
our ability to know this foundation, and our capacity to draw absolute certain conclusions
from this foundation. Kuyper solves this serious difficulty of his foundationalism by
transcending its horizon. Within the horizon of foundationalism, we only find fides humana,
no ‘absolute faith’.44 However, God gives more than a satisfying treatment of these problems.
It is the immediate divine witness of the testimonium spiritus sancti that guarantees absolute
assurance:

a witness of the Holy Spirit which is born, as Calvin puts it, when that same God the
Holy Spirit who spoke centuries ago through the mouth of the apostles and prophets
enters into my heart, and by a supranatural witness imparts to me the indisputable
assurance: I, God-myself, have inspired this Scripture, this divine Word.45

It is the Holy Spirit who provides the necessary assurance.

The result of this transcending move is an unsatisfying theoretical discussion of the
four mentioned problems. Kuyper leaves two questions unanswered: first, are the Scriptures
really a solid foundation? And second, does the foundationalist model really work in theology
or is the model itself inadequate? Instead, the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit functions
on the theoretical level as a reflection stopper. Further, one might ask whether we feel in
Kuyper’s dealing with these problems the Cartesian anxiety: is his strategy a symptom of
fear? Although it is difficult to answer this psychological question, it is significant that
Kuyper himself pictures the absolute certainty as an answer to human anxiety.46

41
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 675.
42
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 677-678.
43
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 678.
44
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 682.
45
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 683
46
Kuyper, Biblical criticism, 678. According to Augustijn, Kuyper was afraid of these problems. J. Kamphuis
denies this is the case, but he does not confront himself with the unsatisfying theoretical treatment of the
problems that pose serious problems to a foundationalist model. Van Bekkum also states that Kuyper was not
afraid of modern biblical studies and questions the relevance of such a psychological interpretation. Nevertheless,
Van Bekkum also leaves open the possibility that fear played a role and signals the theoretical weaknesses in
Kuyper’s model. See Augustijn, ‘Kuypers rede’, 120, 142; J. Kamphuis, Signalen uit de kerkgeschiedenis. Over
We see in Kuyper’s treatment of these problems a combination of the two motives: the
dependency on God alone for the absolute, determinate, certain knowledge. The two motives
are intertwined in a pneumatologically embedded foundationalism. Together, the graphical
inspiration of the Scriptures and the internal testimony of the Spirit safeguard the absolute
certainty.47 In fact, it is clear from the beginning of his address that this is Kuyper’s position,
when he says:

Hence the confession of God, the Holy Spirit, speaks of him also as o` qeólogoj,
Ecclesiae Doctor; "the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God," " for the
Spirit searcheth all things. Yea, the deep things of God " (1 Cor. ii. 10) ; and all real
theology is essentially one beautiful building which, in all ages and among all nations,
has been reared, according to a fixed plan, by that Spiritus Architectonicus whom we,
who are called theologians, merely assist as upper servants.

In his Encyclopdedia, we find the same foundationalism, but there Kuyper has developed the
pneumatological embedding further. When dealing with science in a fallen world, he uses two
types of imagery. First, Kuyper uses organic imagery to distinguish between two kinds of
people, due to the paliggene,sia: the people of the wild vine and the regenerated people of the
true vine.48 This pneumatological emphasis is elaborated christologically. According to
Kuyper, humanity has a general subject which is the subject of science. An individual
scientist is organically related to this general subject. The general subject of the renewed
humanity is Christ. In Him the revealed knowledge of God is taken up into the human
consciousness.49 Second, Kuyper uses the image of two different buildings to refer to two
kinds of science with two different starting points.50 The image of house with a foundation,
referring to science, is combined with the christological-pneumatological image of the new
organism of humanity. The same combination of organic and foundational imagery, we find
in Kuyper’s work more often, e.g. Geworteld en gegrond.51

4. Evaluation

What we find in Kuyper is on the one hand an anti-modern defence of God’s activity in the
world and hence of God’s essential activity in theology. According to Mark Alan Bowald, the
eclipse of God’s agency is one of the big problems of the epistemology of modernity.52 He

de toekomst en de canon (Groningen: De Vuurbaak 1975), 183; Van Bekkum, ‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag’, 94,
97, 100, 103, 107-108.
47
Cf. Van Keulen, Bijbel en dogmatiek, 33, 42-44.
48
Kuyper, Encyclopedia, 150-154.
49
Kuyper, Encyclopedia, 67, 85, 101, 150, 283-288, 291-292, 296, 584. Hence, Van Bekkum’s sketch of a
development from a Christological view of the Scriptures in 1870 to a pneumatological view in 1880 has to be
completed with a development to a Christological and pneumatological view in his Encyclopedia in 1894. Cf.
Van Bekkum, ‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag’, 98-99.
50
Kuyper, Encyclopedia, 155
51
A. Kuyper, „Geworteld en Gegrond.” De Kerk als organisme en instituut. Intreêrede uitgesproken in de
Nieuwe Kerk te Amsterdam, 10 Augustus 1870 door Dr. A. Kuyper (Amsterdam: H. de Hoogh & Co., [1870]).
52
M.A. Bowald, Rendering the Word in Theological Hermeneutics: Mapping Divine and Human Agency
(Aldershot / Burlington VT: Ashgate 2007), 1-23.
values a hermeneutics that acknowledges the divine activity. Accordingly, we should value
positively in Kuyper’s work that he opposes the spirit of modern revolution in theology and
emphasises the work of the triune God. On the other hand, Kuyper is clearly influenced by
modernity’s quest for absolute certainty. His formal defence of Scripture fits very well in the
conservative type of theological foundationalism.53 In his anti-modern and anti-revolutionary
defence of his first motive he uses the very modern model of foundationalism.

This conclusion of an analysis of Kuyper’s The biblical criticism of the present day evokes
two couples of questions: (a) is it wrong to oppose modernity with the means of modern
foundationalism, or is it just a good example of doing contextual theology? What is the
conceptual price of foundationalism? (b) And what should we do in the 21st century after
development of criticisms of foundationalism? What does this all imply for the location of the
doctrine of scripture in systematic theology?

(a) Kuyper’s theology is an example of doing contextual theology. Whether we judge it in

hindsight as is a good example or not, depends on the conceptual price of Kuyper’s solution.
First, it is important to see that when Christian theology follows the strategy of
modern foundationalism, a caricature of a good Christian motive becomes regulative in doing
theology.54 The modern foundationalism of Descartes and Kant sought for certain, unbiased,
and unprejudiced knowledge, apart from the Christian faith. They retained the old ideal of
truth with universal implications, but changed their concept of rationality into a universal and
certain quasi divine reason. John Perry and Marcel Sarot suggest at the background a shifting
view of authority. During the Middle Ages auctoritates where trustworthy persons or texts
that could differ and contradict each other. Creative interpretations did not undermine their
authority. In the rise of Modernity, the credibility of traditional auctoritates was undermined,
to replace them by indubitable foundations.55 The focus of foundationalists narrowed to an
isolated treatment of epistemological questions in the light of an ideal of objective absolute
knowledge.56
The influence of foundationalism can be seen in different aspects of Kuyper’s
treatment of Scripture. First, he shares the isolated focus on epistemological questions and
foundationalism’s ideal of absolute certain knowledge. Second, his defence of Scripture in

53
Cf. Augustijn, ‘Kuypers rede’, 119, 121, 142-144; Van Bekkum, ‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag’, 94-95, 104, 106-
108; Van Keulen, Bijbel en dogmatiek, 61-64.
54
Cf. A.L.Th. de Bruijne, ‘Geworteld en dan opgebouwd wordend in Hem’, in: Van den Brink e.a., Filosofie en
theologie, 156-157.
This interpretation of modern motives as lost sons of Christianity we find also in Oliver O’Donovan’s A Desire
of the Nations, where he understands late Modernity as ‘a parodic and corrupt development of’ Christianity. See
O. O’Donovan, The Desire of the Nations. Rediscovering the Roots of Political Theology, Cambridge University
Press Cambridge 1999, 275.
55
J. Perry, ‘Dissolving the Inerrancy Debate: How Modern Philosophy Shaped the Evangelical View of
Scripture’, Quodlibet Journal 3 (2001) 4, http://www.quodlibet.net/articles/perry-inerrancy.shtml (2012 10 09);
Sarot, ‘Christian Fundamentalism’, 255-259.
56
It is an interesting question to which extend Christianity itself is partly accountable for this development.
Gunton sees the influence of a monolithic conception of God and truth working in the ideals of objectivity and
universality, see Gunton, The One, the Three and the Many, 129. Further, the quest for absolute epistemological
foundations might be analogous to Calvin’s earlier defence of Scripture as a solid foundation. Calvin’s decision
to prove the authority of Scripture over against unbelief and in the conflict with Rome on the authority of the
church, already contains a certain ambivalence, leading to a formal defence of the authority of Scripture in later
Reformed Orthodoxy. Cf. Van den Belt, The Authority of Scripture, 65-70.
formal terms shares its ideal of objectivity and universality. The content of the gospel of Jesus
Christ itself does not play a role in his argument.57 Third, we might feel the Cartesian anxiety,
where Kuyper explicitly refers to anxiety as well as where he deals with problems that
threaten the absolute certainty. In any case, his discussion of these problems is not satisfying
in a theoretical perspective.
When modern foundationalism becomes regulative in theology, theology follows a
theory that is itself doomed to fail. In the crisis of postmodernity we see that foundationalism
could not offer the absolute certainty it promised. Foundationalism has failed as
epistemological theory for different reasons.
First, nobody succeeded in determining the collection of basic propositions. All
philosophical attempts to demarcate a solid foundation have failed.58 Moreover, theologically
this situation cannot be changed by claiming the Scriptures as foundation. Absolute certainty
cannot be given, due to problems concerning the number of books in the canon and the
received text of Scripture, the difference between the original text and its translation, and
questions of interpretation. Kuyper knew this, but he did not really face these problems. He
could not solve this problem theoretically, but presented the immediate divine witness of the
testimonium spiritus sancti as its (at a theoretical level insufficient) solution. Further, we
cannot give a satisfying theoretical justification of the choice for the Bible as foundation. 59
Second, attempts failed to formulate a rule that describes when a proposition is
justified by the foundation or when such a justification is impossible. Since foundationalism
aimed exactly at regulating the building of a scientific theory, this is a fatal problem to the
very foundationalist operation.60
Third, theoretical attempts to establish final foundations lead to the ‘Münchhausen
Trilemma’ of three unsatisfying options of an infinite regress, a logical circle, or an abrupt
termination without good reasons.61 The third option we find as a reality in Kuyper’s rectorial
address.
Finally, human beings have deep convictions they will never give up. However, we
have these deep convictions always in relation to our actions in practical contexts. The
mistake of foundationalism is to think that practical convictions need a justification in terms
of and a translation into absolute theoretical certainty.62 We see Kuyper doing this, when he
tries to give a theoretical justification of the practical assurance of faith.

57
This is remarkable where Kuyper in his earlier days longed for a return to the subject matter of the Scriptures,
back from the bibliolatry of the Reformed Orthodoxy that reduced the Scriptures to a collection of divine words.
See Augustijn, ‘Kuypers rede’, 111; Van Bekkum, ‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag’, 98. Cf. Veenhof , ‘Honderd jaar
theologie aan de Vrije Universiteit’, 52
58
Van den Brink, Almighty God, 15-17; Hoogland, ‘Orthodoxie, moderniteit en postmoderniteit’, 134-135;
Murphy, Beyond Liberalism & Fundamentalism , 90-94; Van den Toren, Breuk en brug, 57-60; Wolterstorff,
Reason within the Bounds of Religion, 46-55
59
Murphy, Beyond Liberalism & Fundamentalism , 14, 80;Wolterstorff, Reason within the Bounds of Religion,
58-62.
60
Hoogland, ‘Orthodoxie, moderniteit en postmoderniteit’, 134; Van den Toren, Breuk en brug, 60; Wolterstorff,
Reason within the Bounds of Religion, 35-45.
61
I.U. Dalferth, Die Wirklichkeit des Möglichen. Hermeneutische Religionsphilosophie (Tübingen: Mohr
Siebeck 2003), 359-360. And also I.U. Dalferth, Gedeutete Gegenwart. Zur Wahrnemung Gottes in den
Erfahrungen der Zeit (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck), 154-155.
62
Dalferth, Gedeutete Gegenwart , 155; Dalferth, Die Wirklichkeit des Möglichen, 360; Van Bekkum,
‘Zekerheid en schriftgezag’, 106-107; Cf. L. Wittgenstein, G. E. M. Anscombe, G.H. von Wright, On Certainty
(New York: Harper & Row 1972).
(b) What does this imply for doing theology in the 21st century? Valuable in Kuyper’s
position is his emphasis on the divine activity. The problem of Kuyper’s pneumatological
embedded foundationalism is not the emphasis on our dependency on God, but the
foundationalist focus on absolute determinate certain knowledge. This implies that Kuyper’s
opposition to the spirit of revolution in theology has to be distinguished from his defence of
foundationalism. Kuyper’s own pneumatological embedding of his foundationalism already
indicates that the foundationalist model does not suffice. The essential activity of God’s Holy
Spirit in theology can be defended without an epistemological foundationalism in the
philosophical sense. It is the Spirit who guides us in all truth, it is the Spirit who renews our
understanding, it is the Spirit who enables us to understand the Scriptures. Consequently, it is
not revolutionary to understand all hermeneutics and all reflection on Scripture theologically
as part of soteriology and pneumatology.
However, it is still a question whether this leads us towards non-foundationalism, as
Nancey Murphy and others claim. Ingolf Dalferth warns against tribalism: when God is God
and truth is truth, we do not as a group determine what is true, and what is truly said about
God concerns everyone and has to be justified in public.63 Comparably, Colin Gunton warns
for intellectual sectarianism, and suggest the option of ‘non-foundationalist foundations’ ‘in a
reasoned approach to truth’.64 Ad de Bruijne claims that ‘Reformed theology will not survive
without a foundation-model’, although it has to be supplemented by an hermeneutical
approach.65
In search for non-foundationalist foundations, it is important to see how the
foundation-metaphor is used in the New Testament. Sometimes foundation (themelios) refers
to Jesus Christ (1 Cor 3,10-11) or to the preaching of the gospel that makes Christ known
(Rom 15,20). Paul furthermore speaks of the foundation of apostles and prophets, with Jesus
Christ himself as the chief cornerstone (akrogoonia) in whom the church grows as a holy
temple (Eph 2,20-21). The image of cornerstone returns in 1 Pet 2,5-6. In 1 Tim 3,15 Paul
describes the church as ‘foundation’ (edraiooma) of the truth. Expressions like ‘being firmly
established’ (Eph 3,17-18) and ‘built up in Him’ (Col 2,7) are related architectural images.66
The foundation-metaphor is a soteriological and ecclesiological one, referring to Christ Jesus
or to the apostles and prophets as founding members of the church.67 As a consequence, the
model of a building with a foundation should not be understood as an epistemological model,
but as a soteriological and ecclesiological model. The church is the temple of the Holy Spirit
and Christ is its cornerstone. It has epistemological implications, because in doctrine the
instruction of Jesus Christ and his apostles is decisive for the church and its members.
However, the metaphor itself is broader, referring to the new life in Christ lived in the
communion of the church. If the Scriptures are used as foundation, they have this significance
only as part of the new churchly life in Christ. We do not read the Scriptures for formal
reasons, but because we find in them Jesus Christ, the new life He gives, and the message of
his gospel. We use the Scriptures because God uses them to transform us into the likeness of
Christ. Kuyper’s view of Scripture as rock and foundation of theology isolates the Scriptures

63
Dalferth, Gedeutete Gegenwart, 19-21, 277.
64
Gunton, The One, the Three and the Many, 134.
65
De Bruijne, ‘Geworteld en dan opgebouwd wordend in Hem’, 157
66
See further Luke 12,32-33; 1 Tim 6,19; 2 Tim 2,19.
67
On this metaphor, see D.J. Williams, Paul and his Metaphors. Their Context and Character (Peaboby MA:
Hendrickson Publishers 1999), 14-17 and 245. And further De Bruijne, ‘Geworteld en dan opgebouwd wordend
in Hem’, 158-159.
from this churchly life and does not fit within the use of the foundation-metaphor in the New
Testament.
To avoid epistemological foundationalism, both Murphy and Gijsbert Van den Brink
follow Willard Van Orman Quine in his plea for epistemological holism and use his
alternative metaphor of a web or network.68 I will follow their plea for epistemological holism,
which implies that hermeneutics and doctrine of Scripture are part of soteriology,
pneumatology or ecclesiology. Doing so, we return in a real anti-revolutionary spirit to the
order of the Nicene creed, where the Scriptures are mentioned between pneumatology and
ecclesiology. Epistemology ‘is a reflexive, not an absolute, intellectual operation’.69 However,
this need to include the obligation to do theology in a rational, public accessible way, always
giving understandable justifications of what we do in theology. In doing theology this way,
concordance with the Scriptures as much as possible is one of the criteria for good systematic
theology.70 We might use the foundation-metaphor to refer to this criterion of scripturally
justified theology in the sense of a non-foundationalist foundation. If in this way we do what
we can to give the Scriptures the decisive voice in theology, the place in systematic
theological order where we reflect on the Scriptures is not that decisive as Kuyper claimed.

To conclude, for the 21st century this implies that we acknowledge that epistemological
reflection is a secondary, reflexive activity. In the order of systematic theology, the doctrine
of Scripture can be made part of soteriology, pneumatology or ecclesiology. Following the
order of the Nicene creed, this order is even more anti-revolutionary than Kuyper’s modern
foundationalist order. Consequently, we can still appreciate Kuyper’s anti-revolutionairy
intention: in receiving, reading and understanding the Scriptures we are dependent on God.
Furthermore, justification of our theology in the light of the Scriptures remains an important
obligation: the canonical Scriptures should have the decisive voice in theology.

68
Van den Brink, Almighty God, 22-25; Murphy, Beyond Liberalism & Fundamentalism , 90-95.
69
Cf. O. O’Donovan, Resurrection and Moral Order. An outline for evangelical ethics (Leicester: Apollos /
Grand Rapids MI: Eerdmans, 2nd edn. 1994), 76.
70
Cf. H. Burger, Being in Christ. A Biblical and Systematic Investigation in a Reformed Perspective (Eugene
OR: Wipf and Stock 2008), 23-25;Van den Brink, Almighty God, 33-40; Van den Toren, Breuk en brug, 37-42.