Why doctrine is necessary

In our holiday reading book list we come to a great Christian classic – and one that you can get straightaway because it is free. the Book is Christianity and Liberalism by the doughty Presbyterian J. Gresham Machen. In this selection, Machen demonstrates that doctrine is necessary for a Christian.

It is often said that Christianity is a life, not a doctrine. This assertion has the appearance of godliness, but it is radically false. One does not even need to be a Christian to detect its falsity. To say that “Christianity is a life” is to make an assertion in the sphere of history, not in the sphere of ideals. It is far different from saying that Christianity ought to be a life, or that the ideal religion is a life. The assertion that Christianity is a life is subject for historical investigation, exactly as we might investigate the assertion that the Roman Empire under Nero was a free democracy. The Roman Empire under Nero might have been better if it had been a free democracy, but the historical question is simply whether it was a free democracy or not; it is a matter of fact. Christianity is an historical phenomenon, like the Roman Empire, or the Kingdom of Prussia, or the United States of America. And as an historical phenomenon it must be investigated on the basis of historical evidence.

Is it true, then, that Christianity is not a doctrine but a life? The question can be settled only by examining the beginnings of Christianity. Recognition of that fact does not involve any acceptance of Christian belief. It is merely a matter of common sense and common honesty. At the foundation of the life of every corporation is the incorporation paper in which the objects of the corporation are set forth. Other objects may be vastly more desirable than those objects, but if the directors use the name and the resources of the corporation to pursue the other objects, then they are acting ultra vires of the corporation. So it is with Christianity. It is perfectly conceivable that the originators of the Christian movement had no right to legislate for subsequent generations. But they did have an inalienable right to legislate for all generations that would choose to bear the name of “Christian.” It is conceivable that Christianity may now have to be abandoned, and another religion substituted for it. But the question of what Christianity is can be determined only by an examination of the beginnings of Christianity.

The beginnings of Christianity constitute a fairly definite historical phenomenon. The Christian movement originated a few days after the death of Jesus of Nazareth. It is doubtful whether anything that preceded the death of Jesus can be called Christianity. At any rate, if Christianity existed before that event, it was Christianity only in a preliminary stage. The name originated after the death of Jesus, and the thing itself was also something new. Evidently there was an important new beginning among the disciples of Jesus in Jerusalem after the crucifixion. The beginning of the remarkable movement which spread out from Jerusalem into the Gentile world is to be placed at that time — the movement which is called Christianity.

Definite historical information has been preserved in the Epistles of Paul about the early stages of this movement. These Epistles are regarded by all serious historians as genuine products of the first Christian generation. The writer of the Epistles had been in direct communication with those intimate friends of Jesus who had begun the Christian movement in Jerusalem. In the Epistles, he makes it abundantly plain what the fundamental character of the movement was.

But if any one fact is clear, on the basis of this evidence, it is that the Christian movement at its inception was not just a way of life in the modern sense, but a way of life founded upon a message. It was based, not upon mere feeling, not upon a mere program of work, but upon an account of facts. In other words it was based upon doctrine.

There should certainly be no debate with regard to Paul himself. Paul was not indifferent to doctrine. On the contrary, doctrine was the very basis of his life. His devotion to doctrine did not, it is true, make him incapable of a magnificent tolerance. One notable example of such tolerance is to be found during his imprisonment at Rome, as attested by the Epistle to the Philippians. Apparently, certain Christian teachers at Rome had been jealous of Paul’s greatness. As long as he had been at liberty they had been obliged to take a secondary place. But now that he was in prison, they seized the supremacy. They sought to raise up affliction for Paul in his bonds. They preached Christ out of envy and strife. In short, the rival preachers made the preaching of the gospel a means to gratify low personal ambition. It seems to have been about as mean a piece of business as could well be conceived. But Paul was not disturbed. “Whether in presence, or in truth,” he said, “Christ is preached; and I do rejoice in that, yea, and will rejoice” (Phil. 1:18). The way in which the preaching was being carried on was wrong, but the message itself was true; and Paul was far more interested in the content of the message than in the manner of its presentation. It is impossible to conceive a finer piece of broad-minded tolerance.

But the tolerance of Paul was not indiscriminate. He displayed no tolerance in Galatia, for example. There were rival preachers there too. But Paul had no tolerance for them. “But though we,” he said, “or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than that which we have preached to you, let him be accursed” (Gal. 1:8). What is the reason for the difference in the apostle’s attitude in the two cases? What is the reason for the broad tolerance in Rome, and the fierce anathemas in Galatia? The answer is perfectly plain. In Rome, Paul was tolerant, because the content of the message that was being proclaimed by the rival teachers was true. In Galatia, he was intolerant, because the content of the rival message was false. In neither case did personalities have anything to do with Paul’s attitude. No doubt the motives of the Judaizers in Galatia were far from pure, and Paul does point out their impurity in an incidental way. But that was not the ground of his opposition. The Judaizers no doubt were far from perfect morally, but Paul’s opposition to them would have been exactly the same if they had all been angels from heaven. His opposition was based entirely upon the falsity of their teaching. They were substituting a false gospel, which was no gospel at all, for the one true gospel. It never occurred to Paul that a gospel might be true for one man and not for another; the blight of pragmatism had never fallen upon his soul. Paul was convinced of the objective truth of the gospel message, and devotion to that truth was the great passion of his life. Christianity for Paul was not only a life, but also a doctrine, and logically the doctrine came first.

But what was the difference between the teaching of Paul and the teaching of the Judaizers? What was it that gave rise to the stupendous polemic of the Epistle to the Galatians? To the modern Church, the difference would have seemed to be a mere theological subtlety. The Judaizers were in perfect agreement with Paul about many things. The Judaizers believed that Jesus was the Messiah. There is not a shadow of evidence that they objected to Paul’s lofty view of the person of Christ. Without the slightest doubt, they believed that Jesus had really risen from the dead. They believed, moreover, that faith in Christ was necessary to salvation. But the trouble was, they believed that something else was also necessary; they believed that what Christ had done needed to be pieced out by the believer’s own effort to keep the Law.

From the modern point of view, the difference would have seemed to be very slight. Paul as well as the Judaizers believed that keeping the law of God, in its deepest import, is inseparably connected with faith. The difference concerned only the logical order of three steps — not even the temporal order. Paul said that a man (1) first believes on Christ, (2) then is justified before God, (3) then immediately proceeds to keep God’s law. The Judaizers said that a man (1) believes on Christ and (2) keeps the law of God the best he can, and then (3) is justified. To modern “practical” Christians, the difference would seem to be highly subtle and intangible, hardly worth considering in view of the large measure of agreement they had in the practical realm. What a splendid cleaning up of the Gentile cities it would have been if the Judaizers had succeeded in extending to those cities the observance of the Mosaic law, even including the unfortunate ceremonial observances! Surely Paul ought to have joined in this common cause with teachers who so nearly agreed with him. Surely he ought to have applied to them the great principle of Christian unity.

As a matter of fact, however, Paul did nothing of the kind; and only because he (and others) did nothing of the kind does the Christian Church exist today. Paul saw very clearly that the differences between the Judaizers and himself were between two entirely distinct types of religion, a religion of merit and a religion of grace. If Christ provides only part of our salvation, leaving us to provide the rest, then we are still hopeless under the load of sin. For no matter how small the gap that must be bridged before salvation can be attained, the awakened conscience sees clearly that our wretched attempt at goodness is insufficient to bridge even that gap. The guilty soul enters again into a hopeless reckoning with God, to determine whether we have really done our part. And thus we groan again under the old bondage of the law. Paul saw clearly that such an attempt to partition the work of Christ with our own merit is the very essence of unbelief. Christ will do everything, or he will do nothing. The only hope we have is to throw ourselves unreservedly on His mercy, and trust Him for all.

Paul was certainly right. The differences which divided him from the Judaizers was no mere theological subtlety. It concerned the very heart and core of the religion of Christ. “Just as I am without one plea, But that Your blood was shed for me” — that was what Paul was contending for in Galatia. That hymn would never have been written if the Judaizers had won. And without the thing which that hymn expresses there is no Christianity at all.

Certainly, then, Paul was no advocate of an undogmatic religion. He was interested above everything else in the objective and universal truth of his message. That much will probably be admitted by serious historians, no matter what their own personal attitude toward the religion of Paul may be. Sometimes, the modern liberal preacher seeks to produce an opposite impression by quoting Paul’s words out of context, and interpreting them in a way as far removed as possible from their original sense. The truth is, it is hard to give Paul up. The modern liberal desires to persuade simple Christians (and himself) that there is some sort of continuity between modern liberalism and the thought and life of the great Apostle. But such an impression is altogether misleading. Paul was not interested merely in the ethical principles of Jesus. He was not interested merely in general principles of religion or of ethics. On the contrary, he was interested in the redeeming work of Christ and its effect upon us. His primary interest was in Christian doctrine, and Christian doctrine not merely in its presuppositions but at its center. If Christianity is to be made independent of doctrine, then Paulinism must be removed from Christianity root and branch.

But what of that? Some men are not afraid of the conclusion. If Paulinism must be removed, they say, we can get along without it. Maybe it will turn out that in introducing a doctrinal element into the life of the Church, Paul was only perverting a primitive Christianity that was as independent of doctrine as the modern liberal preacher desires.

This suggestion is clearly overruled by the historical evidence. The problem certainly cannot be solved so easily. Many attempts have been made to sharply separate the religion of Paul from that of the primitive Jerusalem Church. Many attempts have been made to show that Paul introduced an entirely new principle into the Christian movement, or that he was even the founder of a new religion.7 But all such attempts have resulted in failure. The Pauline Epistles themselves attest a fundamental unity of principle between Paul and the original companions of Jesus. The whole early history of the Church becomes unintelligible except on the basis of such unity. Certainly Paul was no innovator with regard to the fundamentally doctrinal character of Christianity. The fact appears in the whole character of Paul’s relationship to the Jerusalem Church, as attested by the Epistles. It also appears with startling clearness in the precious passage in 1 Cor. 15:3-7, where Paul summarizes the tradition which he had received from the primitive Church. What is it that forms the content of that primitive teaching? Is it a general principle of the fatherliness of God or the brotherliness of man? Is it a vague admiration for the character of Jesus, such as what prevails in the modern Church? Nothing could be further from the fact. “Christ died for our sins,” said the primitive disciples, “according to the Scriptures; he was buried; he has been raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” From the beginning, the Christian gospel, as indeed the name “gospel” or “good news” implies, consisted in an account of something that had happened. And from the beginning, the meaning of what happened was presented. And when the meaning of what happened was presented, there was Christian doctrine. “Christ died” — that is history; “Christ died for our sins” — that is doctrine. Without these two elements, joined in an absolutely indissoluble union, there is no Christianity.

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