Kuyperania April 2015

Cory Brock has reviewed Bratt's Abraham Kuyper in Journal of Theological Studies April 2015.  66 (1): 496-499.

doi: 10.1093/jts/flu202

He begins:

James Bratt's Abraham Kuyper: Modern Calvinist, Christian Democrat offers to the Anglophone world an outstanding and long-desired portrait of the nineteenth-century founder of neo-Calvinism. Bratt is a fair, balanced, and careful historian who makes much of Kuyper’s profound contextual insight, unique application of Calvinist theology, and lasting theological and political legacy without hiding Kuyper’s tendency towards sweeping generalization, blind hubris, and glaring defects. Bratt narrates the central tension in Kuyper between ‘the lust for labor and influence, the regimented discipline that made it good, the passion to make his voice heard [and] the insistence on doing things his way and on his schedule’. Kuyper was, perhaps, the most accomplished man in the modern era, who lived a life of endeavours equalling or exceeding those of the most ambitious.

John Halsey Wood Jr, also has a review of Bratt's Abraham Kuyper  in Journal of Ecclesiatical History 66(02) (April 2015): 454.

The April 2015 issue of Themelios 40(1) has two relevant reviews:

Christopher G. Woznicki on Kuyper Center Review 4.
Robert Covolo on Kuyper's Scholarship

An interview with Willem J. Ouweneel.

The latest addition to the All of life redeemed pages is Willem Ouweneel. The author of several books recently published by Paideia Press.

He kindly agreed to be interviewed.



Could you please tell us something about yourself?

Apart from my biography on AoLR: I am married to Gerdien. We have four children and eleven grandchildren. My great passions are preaching, teaching and writing (and music - see below). My religious background is Plymouth Brethren. Officially I still belong to them, although I preach most of the time in a great variety of denominations.


You work have recently had four books and two more on the way published by Paidiea Press. Could you tell us something about the background to the books - how did they come about? And when are the rest of the series to be published?

My Canadian publisher, John Hultink of Paideia Press, invited me to write several books on several subjects, and then soon one book followed the other... Ten manuscripts are almost finished by now.


You are obviously very prolific in your writings over 160 books published. How do you manage to produce so much - what's the secret?

(a) I started early, (b) I write fast, and (c) I spend most of my time writing.


Your books are written from a dooyeweerdian perspective - where did you first come across this philosophy and why do you find it so helpful?

In many theological books, such as Bible commentaries, there is no "Dooyeweerdian perspective" at all. - In the seventies, I began studying philosophy, and through friends came across writings by Dooyeweerd and his associates, and was fascinated by them.


You differ from Dooyeweerd in that you split his psychic mode into the sensitive and the perceptive - why do feel this is necessary? How have other other dooyeweerdians reacted to this?

I believe the perceptive and the sensitive cannot be reduced to each other, or to a common denominator. Moreover, the sensitive seems to presuppose the perceptive, not the other way round. - I have to admit that I know of no philosophers or psychologists who have adopted my point of view.


You have three earned degrees - why did you choose to do that? Most people find that one is onerous enough, let alone three in three different countries! 

I began with biology, but discovered that I became more and more interested in the great philosophical questions preceding it. So I studied philosophy too. In theology I had been interested all my life. I am the opposite of a specialist (someone who knows virtually everything of virtually nothing): as a generalist, I strive to know virtually nothing about virtually everything. I would have loved to study psychology, musicology and linguistics as well... Please notice that in all three fields in which I obtained degrees, I have done academic work.


Who are the people that have most influenced you and in what ways?

To begin with, the great writers among the Plymouth Brethren (Darby, Kelly, Mackintosh, Grant, etc.). Later also theologians from all the great denominational strands, mostly Evangelical (such as C.S. Lewis) and Reformed (Bavinck, Berkouwer etc.). In philosophy, Dooyeweerd and the great dooyeweerdians.


I notice in the Dutch wikipedia entry on you it notes that you have moved from a creationist to a more guided/ theistic evolution position. Is that right? If so what prompted the shift?

That is not entirely correct. I got disappointed in many "results" of creationist research, but keep an open mind when it comes to the exegesis of Genesis 1-3.


What do you do for fun?

Genealogy (I know about 5000 ancestors of my children) and classical music (I love listening to it, but also singing in all the great classical religious choral works, from Bach to Jenkins; I take part in about ten concerts a year).


What music do you enjoy listening to?

All classical music (from, say, Monteverdi to present), with a preference for late Romanticism and impressionism (Bruckner, Mahler, Richard Strauss, Rachmaninoff, Stravinsky, Debussy, Ravel, Janacek etc.).


What books are you reading at the moment?

I have to admit that I like writers such as John Grisham to 'distract' myself.

If you were on a desert island what two luxuries would you take with you?

A computer with internet (so that, e.g., I could listen to music via, e.g., YouTube, and could keep writing books).

Many thanks. 

Willem has a Dutch website here and tweets at @wjouweneel.

Recent Kuyperania: update on the Kuyper Translation project

The following  is a description of the status of the translation projects as of April, 2015:

1. Pro Rege: Kuyper’s three-volume work on the lordship of Christ will be published and edited precisely as Kuyper viewed them, i.e. as the application of his common grace principles. These volumes are being translated by Albert Gootjes and Nelson Kloosterman. Nelson Kloosterman is doing the editing and annotation for these volumes. Clifford Anderson is writing the introduction.

2. Common Grace: Kuyper’s seminal work comprising three volumes and totaling 1700 pages in the Dutch is being translated for the first time into English. The series is being translated by Nelson D. Kloosterman and Ed M. van der Maas and annotated/edited by Dr. Jordon Ballor and Dr. Stephen Grabill. Dr. Richard Mouw has provided the introduction. Volume one is completed and available for purchase.

3. Abraham Kuyper Church Anthology: key essays and speeches that Kuyer gave on the church have been translated. The anthology will include selections from Kuyper’s doctoral dissertation on the theology of John Calvin and John a Lasco; various treatises and sermons such as the Twofold Fatherland and Address on Missions; and selections from Kuyper’s larger works on the church, such as Kuyper’s commentary on the Heidelberg Catechism. The centerpiece will be Kuyper’s programmatic statement Tract on the Reformation of the Churches, which takes a unique approach to ecclesiology. Dr. John Halsey Woods, author of the award winning book titled Going Dutch in the Modern Age: Abraham Kuyper’s Struggle for a Free Church in the Nineteen Century Netherlands, is editing this anthology.

4. Abraham Kuyper and Islam: this volume will provide an English translation of the significant pieces that Kuyper wrote about Islam, together with one or more essays of commentary on the context and import of his thought. Dr. Jim Bratt, Professor of History at Calvin College, in conjunction with other scholars, has selected various sections from Abraham Kuyper’s two travel volumes: Om de Oude Werelde-Zee for translation. Dr. Jan van Vliet, Professor of Economics at Dordt College, is doing the translation work for this project. Dr. Bratt is serving as the editor.

 This book will provide students, scholars, pastors, and interested laity with an instructive model for observing another faith and its cultural ramifications from an informed Christian point of view. The importance of this anthology is underscored in that we are not discussing just any faith but that of Islam, when at this moment its role on the global scene is so visible and controversial, its future so significant, and its relationships with Christianity so crucial for both faiths.

5. Abraham Kuyper Business, Economics, and Care of the Poor anthologies. Plans are to translate and publish Kuyper’s major speeches and essays on these subjects in two separate anthologies. The first anthology will contain material on business, ecomonics, and personal social ethics. The second volume will include material on the care of the poor. Dr.Peter Heslam, Dr. Harry VanDyke, and Dr. Jim Bratt are assisting in the selection of material to be included in these two anthologies. Dr. Harry VanDyke will translate and annotate the material for these two volumes.

6. Abraham Kuyper on Christian Education: An Anthology of Essays is a translation of a number of Kuyper’s important essays and speeches on education. In anticipation of this anthology, we have translated and published as a teaser volume Kuyper’s Scolastica I and II-- two convocations addresses that Abraham Kuyper gave as rector of the Vrije Universiteit (Free University) in Amsterdam. In these two important addresses Kuyper shares his view of the divine purpose of scholarship for human culture. Additionally, the reader will encounter a human side of Kuyper that is not always readily apparent in his other works.

The education anthology will include Kuyper’s important essay entitled “Bound to the Word,” which discusses the topic of what being bound by the word of God means within the entire world of human thought. The Kuyper education anthology will also include extracts from important parliamentary speeches by Kuyper on the subject of education, plus a translation of Kuyper’s sixteenth article about schooling that appeared in his daily newspaper in 1880 under the title of “Antirevolutionary Also in Your Household.” Other important speeches and essays that Kuyper gave on education are included as well as material on Kuyper’s views on vouchers. Dr. Wendy Naylor and Dr. Harry Van Dyke will serve as co-editors for the Kuyper Education Anthology. Dr. Naylor, Dr. Van Dyke, Dr. John Bolt, and Dr. Nelson Kloosterman have all assisted in the selection and translation of material for this important anthology.

Two new excellent pieces from Jonathan Chaplin

Jonathan Chaplin has had two excellent pieces published very recently. They are both worth a read:

Living with liberalism in Comment

Christian Scholarship Beyond the Theological Guild Fulcrum:

"Insofar as mentoring in this kind of Christian scholarship takes place in the UK it is ad hoc and episodic. As far as I can tell it is offered from one of four sources:

• by a rather small group of individual Christian scholars in non-theological disciplines who have intentionally equipped themselves for the task;

• by a handful of faith-oriented research institutes in secular universities;

• by individuals or programmes within the Cathedrals Group of 16 church-related universities and university colleges;

• by postgraduate or faculty ministry programmes operating outside or on the fringes of the university (e.g.: Oxford’s ‘Developing a Christian Mind’, ‘Transforming the Mind’, ‘Faith in Scholarship’, or Christian Academic Network)."

Dooyeweerd: What is religion?

What is religion?

Herman Dooyeweerd

To the question, what is understood here by religion? I reply: the innate impulse of human selfhood to direct itself toward the true or toward a pretended absolute Origin of all temporal diversity of meaning, which it finds focused concentrically in itself.

This description is indubitably a theoretical and philosophical one, because in philosophical reflection an account is required of the meaning of the word "religion" in our argument. This explains also the formal transcendental character of the description, to which the concrete immediacy of the religious experience remains strange.

If, from out of the central religious sphere, we seek a theoretical approximation of it, we can arrive only at a transcendental idea, a limiting concept, the content of which must remain abstract, as long as it is to comprehend all possible forms in which religion is manifested (even the apostate ones). Such an idea invariably has the function of relating the theoretical diversity of the modal aspects to a central and radical unity and to an Origin.

From: Dooyeweerd, H. 1953. New Critique of Theoretical Thought Volume 1. The Necessary Presuppositions of Philosophy. Philadelphia: P&R, p. 57.

A Good Friday meditation - by Abraham Kuyper

REDEMPTION THROUGH HIS BLOOD

Abraham Kuyper

In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace (Ephesians 1:7).

At Venice, in a Roman Catholic church, officials will show visitors a drop of Jesus’ blood, spattered upon a piece of cloth, carefully preserved. Whether this drop of blood was actually shed by Jesus can never be proved. That it was not is as hard to demonstrate. There is nothing to say against supposing that one of the women who followed Jesus, out of tender regard for Him, blotted up with her skirt some of the blood spattered against the cross or oozing from the thorn-pierced brow. It is not impossible to believe that this piece of cloth was carefully preserved, that it tremulously passed from mother to daughter, until it eventually passed into the hands of ecclesiastical officials.

But, even though nothing compels us to regard such a piece of cloth and drop of blood as unactual, even, in fact, if the actuality of these could be scientifically demonstrated, that bloody mark upon that piece of linen would add nothing to our faith. Granted that the blood were actual, it would not be that blood of which the apostle said that “through it” we have redemption. To those who penetrate more deeply, that drop of blood is blood no longer. Blood is a material substance which has life. When that life leaves it, when that blood congeals and dries, it is nothing more than decaying matter. It has neither life nor potency.

Hence, God’s people may not look to such a preserved particle of the blood of Christ for redemption, but must look to the red blood of Christ, to the blood of Christ when it was still blood, when Christ’s life still coursed with it, when it was still warm by reason of the life-warmth of the exertion of our Lord’s soul.

There is no atonement without blood. Hence, no one may mock the confession of the church of God which asserts that redemption comes by “faith in His blood.” The scornful laughter of the ungodly at the so-called “blood-theology” will, we fear, some day severely aggravate their suffering. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints: How much more precious, then, the death of the Son of God? Nor are we to believe the interpretation that this love was revealed in that blood and that it is really by His love, not by His blood, that we are saved. For the love of Christ is as clearly manifest in the statement made in the counsel of peace: “In the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will.”

No, but the Church of God must, in a literal sense, cling to the beautiful teaching of the apostles and must in quiet reverence confess that she has her redemption through His blood.

That does not, of course, mean that that blood was the source, the fountain out of which salvation flowed, or that the Lord God was first moved to reveal His grace by that blood. Those who think so are not familiar with the Holy Scriptures. The apostle adds the explanation that blood is effectual only according to the riches of His grace. That means, then, that the source of the blessedness, the fountain of salvation, lies not in the blood but in God’s eternal grace, which is superabundantly laid away as a treasure for all His elect. Nevertheless, the Church clings tenaciously to the truth that in the incomprehensible counsel of eternal grace, saving grace is in its effects attached to the blood of Christ. Let no one wishing to avoid that condemnation try to break that relationship between grace and blood. “For the life of the flesh is the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.”

Hence we need not guess or conjecture, but we can know what is the seat, the source of this mystery of grace. That source lies not in the corpuscles nor in the plasma, but in the soul of the body.

An animal, or a human creature, is really a wonderful organism. One can come upon it as a composition of matter and moisture lying prostrate. Suddenly one sees it move, arise and approach. One hears sounds issuing from it, and, if it is a human being, one hears songs of freedom and of praise. How is that possible? The Scriptures say that is due to the miracle of blood. Conceive, if you can, of the creature you saw without blood. The composition of matter would crumble then and would decay. But the creature has blood. Hence it has life, unsearchable, incomprehensible life, and that life, the Scriptures say, exists in the blood. God, the Creator of animal life, tells us: “Life, the soul of the body, exists in the blood.” Hence the seriousness of illnesses of the blood; hence the fatality when thirst causes the blood to become parched. Whatever affects the blood affects the whole human being.

Everything depends, therefore, upon a true and certain knowledge that our Refuge and Mediator really poured out His blood for us. That does not mean, of course, that all of our Saviour’s blood flowed away. In fact, very little blood flowed from Jesus’ wounds before He died. It gushed forth only after the spear had been thrust into His side afterwards. Before that, a little had oozed from His whipped shoulders, a little from His thorn- lacerated brow and a little from the wounds of the nails in His hands and feet. It was not a matter of quantity, but of the soul of the body contained in it.

The certainty we needed for full assurance of redemption was this: That He poured His blood for us, that the soul of the body contained in that blood was again separated from it by death, or, in Isaiah’s words, that “He hath poured out his soul unto death.”

John appreciated our need of that assurance most. The Lord God knew that we needed it. Hence He planned it so that a brutal soldier, doing what no one who loved Jesus could have done, profaned Christ’s body by driving his spear into it. Therefore he who loved Jesus, the beloved Apostle John, seeing that brutal act, confirmed it for us preciously, saying that “he saw it” and that he saw that the water issuing from the wound was blood no longer. “Forthwith came there out blood and water.” By that statement we are assured that the soul of Christ’s body had departed from it.

Taken from: Kuyper, A. 1960. The Death and Resurrection of Christ: Messages for God Friday and Easter. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, pp. 60-62.