April 26, 2018 Show with Marco Barone on “Luther’s Augustinian Theology of the Cross”

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April 27, 2018

April 26, 2018: Marco Barone, a doctoral candidate in philosophy, author & blogger @ PhilosophyOfTheCross.blogspot.com who will address: “LUTHER’s AUGUSTINIAN Theology of the CROSS”

00:01: Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown
00:08: Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,
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00:57: Now here's our host, Chris Arnton. Good afternoon
01:05: Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at IronSharpensIronRadio .com.
01:13: This is Chris Arnton, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 26th day of April 2018, and I am delighted to have on the program for the very first time today,
01:28: Marco Barone, who is a doctoral candidate in philosophy. He's an author and blogger at philosophyofthecross .blogspot
01:37: .com. That's philosophyofthecross .blogspot .com. Today we are going to be addressing his book,
01:45: Luther's Augustinian Theology of the Cross, the Augustinianism of Martin Luther's Heidelberg Disputation and the
01:53: Origins of Modern Philosophy of Religion, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Marco Barone.
02:03: Hello Chris, hello everybody. I'm glad to be here. Yes, and Marco is calling us all the way from Northern Ireland, and obviously from your accent.
02:14: That is not an accent I detect as being an Ulsterman's accent. Where are you originally from?
02:21: No, it's not an Ulsterman accent. I am originally from Italy. That's what I figured. A small town not too far from Naples.
02:33: And I've been abroad for six years now. Now do you pronounce your name
02:40: Barone or Barone? Barone, with a final A or E.
02:46: So it's Barone? Barone, yes, that's correct. Okay, and I was delighted to discover that someone who is one of my favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, David J.
02:59: Engelsma, wrote the foreword to your book. And another very dear friend of mine,
03:05: Jeffrey C. Waddington, also wrote a commendation for the book. I am going to read
03:11: Dr. Engelsma, well I'll read a portion of what he has written for your foreword.
03:19: Barone's book is a superb and convincing treatment of a grand subject, the faithfulness of Martin Luther to the theology of Augustine, or Augustine, in proclaiming a radical gospel of grace founded on what
03:35: Luther called the theology of the cross, in contrast to the heretical theology of glory.
03:44: And before we even go into the subject matter of your book, typically
03:50: Marco, when I have a guest on for the very first time on Iron Sharpens Iron, I have them describe the religion of their upbringing, if any, and how our sovereign
04:02: Lord got a hold of you providentially, what the circumstances were that he brought about into your life that drew you to himself and saved you.
04:12: Yes, so I was born and raised in Italy, as I said, in a nominal
04:19: Roman Catholic family. At the age of 17,
04:25: I came across Evangelicalism and Protestantism for the first time, and my first encounter with Protestantism or Evangelicalism was with Pentecostalism.
04:39: Then around the age of 19, or shortly before that, I started reading about the
04:49: Reformation and Calvin and Luther and Calvinism and so on and so forth, mostly on the internet.
04:59: Then after that,
05:04: I studied philosophy in Naples for three years, where I got my
05:12: BA in philosophy. And this time was a time of meditation, knowing and trying to know, trying to understand what to do, because in my area, there was no church.
05:27: There are many dear brothers there, but there was no church, what I call worship, with a good conscience.
05:34: So I finally, in 2012, decided to move to Limerick, where I joined the
05:40: Limerick Reform Fellowship. And the minister of the Limerick Reform Fellowship is a person that you know,
05:46: Chris, it's Reverend McGill. Yes, I had the pleasure of interviewing him. It was a real joy.
05:53: We discussed Amillennialism. Yes, yes, exactly. Yeah, he was my minister for three years.
06:02: We actually lived in the same house for three years, so we know each other quite well. And then in Limerick, I gained my
06:14: MA, and the product of my MA is the book we are discussing today.
06:21: And after that, I was blessed to gain a
06:26: PhD in philosophy in Belfast, and at the moment,
06:32: I'm studying not Luther, but Jonathan Edwards. And that's the very brief version of my story.
06:41: Well, praise God. And by the way, let me give a plug also to your former pastor's book,
06:49: Called to Watch for Christ's Return, is the book by Martin McGill.
06:56: That's how you pronounce that, right? McGill? Yes, McGill. McGill. And you can get that book from Reform Free Publishing Association at RFPA .org.
07:08: That's RF for Reform Free, PA for Publishing Association .org. And I was, go ahead,
07:15: I'm sorry. Yeah, if I may interrupt you, for those in the UK and Ireland, and in Europe in general, if they like to acquire that book you mentioned, they can visit the website of my current church,
07:30: CPRC .co .uk, where they can buy the book there, and so they can, you know, pay less in shipping.
07:40: Okay, great. And you can feel free to repeat that if you want. Yeah, the website is
07:46: CPRC .co .uk. Great, and we'll have you repeat that at the end of the program as well, if we remember.
07:55: And I was also very pleased to find out that my new associate pastor, or I should say the associate pastor, the new associate pastor of the church where I'm a member,
08:06: Simon O'Maney, knows of you and is looking forward to getting in and reading your book as well.
08:15: Good, yeah, I'm glad to hear. Yes, we met once in Limerick. We met once in the fellowship where that I was attending at a time when he was still in Ireland, so I don't think he started yet his theological studies in the
08:34: States. Yes, yes, he finished his theological studies in California and is now here in Pennsylvania as the associate pastor of Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where I am pleased to be a member.
08:48: Well, can you tell me why you as a theologically reformed
08:54: Christian, otherwise known as a Calvinist, if we were to give you a nickname, why are you so fascinated and drawn to Martin Luther?
09:04: Some people might scratch their heads and wonder why, and especially perhaps
09:09: Lutherans would. But why is Luther such a fascinating figure for a
09:14: Calvinist? I think Luther is and has to be, in a sense, a fascinating figure, or at least a very important figure for all
09:29: Calvinists, because as Calvinists we believe that the Lord guided his true church in the truth, and he did that through the appointed ministers and pastors and theologians that he has given to the
09:45: Church. And Luther was highly considered, even from the
09:54: Reformation theologians that we Calvinists refer to the most, to whom we refer the most, that is
10:01: John Calvin. John Calvin had a very high consideration of Luther, and rightly so, because Luther did not invent the gospel of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, overnight.
10:22: Yeah, unlike what our Roman Catholic friends will accuse us of believing, a gospel that didn't exist until the 16th century, and that's an absurd and slanderous charge against us.
10:38: It is, yes. I have to say that in my studies I have found some
10:45: Roman Catholics and some Roman Catholic scholars and theologians who admit the presence of, in the writers and theologians of the past, of the five solas, of the five onlys of the
11:04: Reformation, including Augustine. But yes, there is quite a widespread belief according to which the teaching of the
11:15: Reformation and salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, to the glory of God alone, as taught in the
11:26: Scripture alone, there is the belief that these teachings are an invention of the
11:32: Reformers, and this is false. I believe this is false, and in my book I think
11:39: I have demonstrated that Luther's theology of the cross, as expounded in the
11:45: Heidelberg Disputation, is distinctively and deeply
11:52: Augustinian. The teachings that Luther expounds in that Disputation are taken and grounded and based on the teachings of Augustine of Ypres, the greatest of the early church theologians.
12:10: Let me give our email address to our listeners if they have any questions of their own. It is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com,
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12:33: Let's say that you disagree with your own congregation where you are a member on this subject matter that we're discussing.
12:41: Perhaps you're a Roman Catholic and you're calling in with questions and you would rather not draw attention to your identity.
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12:57: Well, I know that Martin Luther in the 16th century, before the
13:03: Lord opened his eyes to the true gospel of the scriptures, I know that he was an Augustinian monk and he must have had some kind of fondness for Augustine in his heart and mind.
13:18: And there are people that you may be aware of who are not only
13:23: Roman Catholic, but even some of our fundamentalist Baptist and other fundamentalist
13:31: Protestant friends who are not Calvinist or perhaps even anti -Calvinist, they will often bring up our fondness for Augustine and the fact that we pay tribute to him as a true father of the faith.
13:48: We know that Calvin also drew a lot of his theology not only from the scriptures, but also the way
13:56: Augustine taught and explained the scriptures. And they will use this as a part of their rhetoric to disparage our theology as if it is too
14:10: Roman Catholic in some way, which is always, to me, very bizarre because those who are anti -Calvinists are usually much more soteriologically in alignment with Roman Catholicism than they realize.
14:25: But if you could explain why we should and why
14:31: Luther did and why Calvin did view Augustine as a genuine doctor of the church whom we should be ready to glean wisdom from, even though we should not obviously view him as an infallible writer.
14:52: He was not like the human authors of scripture. He was not communicating
14:59: God -breathed words when he wrote. He was a fallible man, but a brilliant man and used mightily of God.
15:08: So tell us why we should look upon him as a valuable and faithful source of information on what the
15:15: Bible teaches. First of all, I would like to say that Augustine was not a
15:21: Roman Catholic. Augustine was a Catholic. Augustine lived in an era which was placed before the
15:32: Counter -Reformation, before centuries, many centuries before the
15:38: Council of Trent, and many, even more sacred centuries before the
15:43: Second Vatican Council. So Augustine, at that time, although he was a very humble person, everybody was in awe in front of Augustine's genius, including the
16:04: Bishop of Rome, including the Pope at that time. Augustine was an authority. So the
16:11: Roman Catholic system at that time was not as developed as it then will take shape.
16:19: There was no papacy, for instance, at that time. Pardon me? There was no papacy at that time, unlike the claims of Roman Catholics who claim that they trace their popes all the way back to Peter the
16:34: Apostle. There is no documentation or historical record that Augustine would have viewed the
16:40: Bishop of Rome as his pope. No, no. Augustine never mentioned anything close to the expression of submission that today
16:56: Roman theologians express, or even the Roman Catholic theologians at the time of the
17:06: Reformation expressed towards the Pope. There is nothing like that in Augustine. Augustine highly esteemed the
17:13: Bishop of Rome and all the other bishops, but no, there is no such thing as the papacy as we know it in the modern definition of the papacy.
17:29: Moreover, Augustine is important why?
17:35: Also because, as I said at the beginning, we do not believe, as some of the fundamentalists you have mentioned, that we do not believe that the
17:46: Lord left his church to a bunch of corrupted theologians.
17:54: He never did that. The church always had the true gospel, even in the darkest moments that someone prays in the medieval period.
18:06: Even in the blackest era of the church, there was the true church, there was the true gospel preached somewhere, there were true ministers of Jesus Christ preaching the gospel and teaching the gospel and lecturing about the gospel.
18:27: Augustine was certainly one of these. Augustine was placed in Northern Africa. There was a bastion of the theology of grace of that time.
18:40: And so, since we believe this, since we believe that God always guides his church, is always with his true church, and since we see in the teaching of Augustine, in the works of Augustine, how passionate he is for expounding the gospel of grace that he reads in the
19:01: Bible, that how in accordance the words of Augustine are with the words of Paul and the other writers of the
19:12: Bible on matters of salvation. And since we know all these things, it is essential to know that people like Augustine, not necessarily, of course, not everybody needs to know about this important theologians of history from a scholarly point of view.
19:36: You see, not everybody is called to be a scholar, of course. Now, everybody has his own worthy and lawful calling, but even the believer who is not called to be a scholar or who is not into, let's say, history or historical theology that much, or is not into reading that much, he needs to know.
20:02: The Calvinist and Reformist and Protestant believer needs to know that the gospel that Luther teached and the gospel that John Calvin expounded in his writing and preaching and teaching is solidly grounded in the
20:24: Bible, first of all, and secondly, as a support to that in Augustine. Now, Luther is a fascinating character because many of us who are theologically reformed, aka
20:41: Calvinists, delight in what he has written.
20:47: We delight that he echoes what we believe about the depravity of the human will, the bondage of the will, which was made clear in his debate with Erasmus.
21:02: And then we are puzzled at other times by his belief in baptismal regeneration, which seems to conflict with the great watchword of the
21:15: Reformation, Sola Fide. How much of his theology was
21:23: Augustinian, which most of us who are Calvinists believe that Augustine had much of the same view on election and other things that, centuries later,
21:39: John Calvin would later echo and embrace as his own. It seems that Augustine was one of, if not the greatest hero, next to Christ, of course, of John Calvin.
21:56: And so where does the similarity come into play here with what
22:02: Augustine believed soteriologically and what Luther believed? So your question relates to the sacrament of baptism, is that right?
22:12: Well, not exclusively. Also, for instance, today you will hardly ever find a
22:19: Missouri Synod Lutheran or a Wisconsin Synod Lutheran or other conservative
22:25: Lutheran who would also be soteriologically similar to a
22:31: Calvinist in regard to unconditional election. And even since we're talking about the cross today, about a particular redemption or definite atonement, or as it's sometimes called, limited atonement.
22:44: So I was just curious, how much of what Augustine believed was continued in the life of Luther's belief and writings?
22:56: Certainly from the point of view of the so -called five points of Calvinism, certainly
23:03: Augustine has a stronger resemblance with Calvin, with John Calvin, rather than with Martin Luther.
23:13: Augustine believed in total depravity. Augustine believed in unconditional election.
23:21: There is very strong evidence that Augustine believed in limited atonement. There is clear evidence that Augustine believed in the effectual call of the elect and that he believed, of course, in the perseverance of the saints.
23:40: I think from my study of Luther, especially the young Luther, I think that Luther initially believed all these things.
23:51: He believed all these five points. In his commentary on Romans, Luther, for example, talks about the atonement and he says that the atonement is accomplished exclusively for the elect, not for everybody.
24:12: Then, with the passing of the time, he came to change his view a little bit, possibly also because of the influence of his good friend, but theologically strong,
24:27: Melanchthon, yes, Melanchthon, and also maybe because of contingencies and needs like the one to subscribe and to put together a confession and a creed that then will become the
24:47: Concordia, what we call today the Book of Concord, with the Asper Confession and so on and so forth.
24:54: So there is this difference that on this side, when it comes to the five points of Calvinism, places
25:04: Augustine closer to John Calvin rather than to Luther.
25:14: Just out of curiosity, I think, and I could be wrong, that in spite of everything you said,
25:21: I think paradoxically Augustine also did believe in baptismal regeneration, did he not?
25:28: Augustine believed in, yes, he did believe that, he believed that baptism could take away original sin.
25:39: And then we find also here what you mentioned earlier, that these men, of course, they are great men of God, they are giants of the faith, but they are not infallible.
25:50: In fact, Augustine believed that a person could be effectually baptized, but then lose this benefit of salvation.
26:03: And then he has to come up with, in some of his writings, he has to come up with an explanation how does this cohere with his view of the perseverance of the saints.
26:16: And also on this side, on this point of baptism, he is closer to Luther in a sense.
26:26: But even here, we have to say that Augustine also was a genius and a developer of theology, of the good theology, because Calvin often quotes
26:36: Augustine on the Lord's Supper and baptism, because Augustine believed and expounded some more, developed some more the baptism as a sign, as a spiritual, sorry, as a visible sign of a spiritual reality.
26:55: That is, the baptism as a sign of what happens inside of us at salvation, at regeneration.
27:05: The spiritual baptism, the real baptism that we receive when we are, when all believers, without exception, are baptized in the
27:14: Holy Spirit and regenerated, and their minds and eyes are open to see the truth.
27:21: Augustine has nice things to say about this, and in fact, Calvin quotes him on this, and also
27:28: Luther on other occasions. So, also on this, let's say
27:35: Augustine is not entirely to throw away, so to speak, but of course we disagree with him, we disagree, we
27:45: Calvinists disagree with his view of baptism potentially taking away original sin.
27:53: We're going to go to our first break right now, and if anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,
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28:11: If you live outside the USA, please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter, and in fact,
28:18: I will ask you one question that has come in already and have you answer it when we return from the commercial break.
28:25: This is a question from Gordy in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, and he says, would you please explain what
28:31: Luther means by the theology of glory? We'll have you respond to that question momentarily when we return from our first commercial break, and we will be right back,
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35:26: But anyway, we are back now with our discussion on Luther's Augustinian Theology of the
35:36: Cross. We are discussing this with Marco Barone, and if you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is chrizarnsen at gmail .com,
35:46: c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com, and please, as always, give us your first name, your city and state, and country of residence if you live outside the
35:54: USA. And I read to you before the break a question from Gordy in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who said,
36:02: Would you please explain what Luther means by the theology of glory? The theology of glory is one of the two main expressions that Luther coined or produced while preparing his
36:22: Heidelberg Disputation. The other one is the theology of the cross. In fact, if you could even tell us what the
36:28: Heidelberg Disputation is. Yes, the Heidelberg Disputation is an academic theological disputation that happened exactly 500 years ago today.
36:42: Today is the 500th anniversary of this disputation, and it was a disputation that Luther had in front of, with a colleague, with a colleague student, in front of the
37:03: Augustinian Order, in front of the main authorities of the German Augustinian Order. The setting of the discussion was according to the medieval way of doing a disputation.
37:16: There is, there were theses with proofs, and then the people present there discussed with a theologian or a professor or student who was defending those theses.
37:33: They discussed them with him, asking questions, questioning him, debating it, debating the thesis, and so on and so forth.
37:42: So in this thesis Luther wanted to, wanted to make a point, to make a statement of what he was trying to do with his theological teaching and preaching.
37:59: Luther contrasted these two theologies, the theology of glory and the theology of the cross.
38:05: What is the matter with the theology of glory? The theology of glory is any theology, according to Luther, that does not have a biblical and proper teaching of the cross of Christ.
38:21: The cross of Christ for Luther is absolutely necessary for salvation, for knowing
38:30: God, not only for being saved, but also for having a functional fellowship and enjoying a functional communion with God.
38:43: So he calls it theology of glory because this theology claims to go to glory, that is to the glory of heaven, without passing through the cross of Christ.
38:59: So he calls it theology of glory. Mostly and primarily
39:04: Luther places in this category of theologies of glory those theologies like, for example,
39:11: Arminianism or Pelagianism or Semi -Pelagianism. Of course
39:17: Luther doesn't talk about Arminianism because he was farther, he was developed later on in history.
39:24: I'm talking about Arminianism in principle. He places all these theologies in the category of the theology of glory because they ultimately give the ultimate word for salvation to man.
39:45: That is, they make salvation ultimately dependent on man. In many evangelical circles there is the saying,
39:54: God has done 99%, you have to do 1%. Well, that's theology of glory according to Luther.
40:05: That's not understanding properly the cross of Christ and the reasons why the cross of Christ happened and the theological consequences and teachings that the cross of Christ tells us.
40:23: That is, the salvation is from beginning to the end entirely dependent and entirely a work of God alone.
40:33: Amen. Well, the thing that's ironic going back to what we were saying earlier is that I don't think any
40:41: Christian outside of the Reformed faith or Calvinism can actually consistently and logically make that claim.
40:50: Yeah, I think I agree. I think I agree. And this is another reason why
41:02: I think we Calvinists have so much interest in Luther, because Luther, although he did not do that with the consistency and the clarity that Calvin did,
41:14: Luther still believed that salvation is entirely dependent on God.
41:20: Still, he always believed that God is the only author of salvation.
41:26: He always believed in a monergistic view of salvation.
41:33: He always thought that salvation is entirely dependent on God. He certainly believed that.
41:38: He certainly emphasized that very powerfully in his earlier career, and this is clear from the
41:45: Albrecht disputation and also for another great work by Martin Luther, The Bondage of the
41:51: Will. Now, you're saying something that's interesting and also simultaneously confusing, because from what
42:01: I understood from all my reading of Luther and the history surrounding him and all the guests that I've had on this program, both
42:10: Lutheran and Reformed, it seemed that historically
42:16: Luther, in his earlier ministry, even after his conversion and leaving the
42:24: Roman Catholic Church, unwillingly, by the way, as we know, he fled for his life because he was surely going to be exiled.
42:33: But he seemed to be much more
42:39: Roman Catholic in his earlier years, even after his conversion to biblical
42:46: Christianity and what we would call now Protestantism. And he, over the years, shedded more and more of the baggage of Rome, although he never completely shed everything that we would call unbiblical baggage of Rome.
43:03: He seemed to become more and more biblically sound as the years went on, but in this area, you seem to be indicating that a reverse is happening.
43:13: No, no, I agree. I totally agree with you. And you're right. Your correction is right.
43:19: I should have said that Luther believed in this gospel of absolute grace after he discovered the gospel.
43:30: Before he discovered the gospel, he trembled in fear and despair under the fear of the
43:40: Word of God. And then he discovered that the righteousness of God revealed in not the attribute of God, according to which he is perfectly holy and righteous and cannot stand sin, but is the righteousness of Christ that God graciously gives to the believer who believes and has faith.
44:03: But I do believe that after this discovery, Luther almost immediately started realizing and realized that salvation depends on God alone.
44:15: If we read Luther's lectures on Romans, they were lectures delivered to the students in Wittenberg between 1515 and 1516.
44:33: In those lectures, we can read a very strong Luther on salvation, a
44:40: Luther that teaches the gospel of grace alone, and even faith alone,
44:47: I would say, even though in there, he's not as clearly expressed as in the later work, but it is there nonetheless.
45:00: So I actually encourage people to read Luther's lectures on Romans that are published are quite easily available today, and to see by themselves what
45:17: Luther says in that commentary. On the other side, you also have to say, yes, then Luther gradually renounced and rejected things like, for example, the purgatory.
45:30: We know that when Luther kneeled at the door of the
45:37: Church of Wittenberg, the 95 Theses, we know that in that thesis, purgatory is never really denied.
45:47: Right, he was still a Catholic, he was a monk. He still believes in these things.
45:52: At that time, Luther still wants to submit to the Pope at the condition that the
45:59: Pope believes what the scripture teaches. Yeah, he was really opposing the sale of indulgences to rescue people out of purgatory and the abuse of those sales.
46:12: Rather than opposing indulgences and purgatoriats themselves, he was really starting off with just the way that Tetzel and others were abusing, playing upon the fears of men and also upon the greed of Rome.
46:31: That's how St. Peter's Basilica was built, was through frightening people to give money in order to rescue themselves out of purgatory through the giving of alms and so forth.
46:43: Exactly, and this practice and these beliefs like purgatory and indulgences, in the bondage of the will,
46:55: Luther calls them drivels or nonsense, because although they have to be condemned, they have to be exposed for what they are, these lies, and so forth.
47:09: Luther believed that these are symptoms of a wrong understanding of salvation, of a wrong understanding of the cross of Christ, of a wrong understanding of the grace of God.
47:21: In fact, the 95 Theses themselves, which we remember were produced in 1517, the 95
47:30: Theses finish with something like this, a way with all those who say, peace, peace, where there is no peace.
47:40: And then he goes on saying, welcome all those who say cross, cross, where there is no cross.
47:47: So he closes the 95 Theses with the real issue, that is the cross of Christ, that he, the
47:55: Luther, will discuss then the year after in front of his Augustinian colleagues in Wittberg in 15, in the
48:05: April of 1518, where he will discuss the true gospel, where he will expound in front of his colleagues the true biblical gospel of salvation by grace alone, through faith alone.
48:22: We have Tyler, oh by the way, I forgot to tell Gordie in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, that you have won a free copy of Luther's Augustinian Theology of the
48:34: Cross by our guest Marco Barone, with, excuse me?
48:41: No, I said to her, enjoy. Through, I'm sorry, you got to repeat that, I'm sorry. No, I said to our guest, to the person who won the book,
48:52: I said enjoy the book. Oh, okay, forgive me for not being completely clear on the
48:58: Italian accent. No, I take the entire blame,
49:03: I understand. I think that you're the first person that I've interviewed with an
49:10: Italian accent, if I'm not mistaken. But anyway, Gordie, since Mechanicsburg is very close to Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com,
49:20: right there on North Hanover Street in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, why don't you swing by tomorrow and pick up your free copy of Marco Barone's book, rather than making cvbbs .com
49:33: pay the postage fee to mail that to you. So I know that Mechanicsburg is extremely close, so please stop by there tomorrow between 10 a .m.
49:41: and 4 30 p .m. eastern time and you can pick up that book. Tyler in Mastic Beach, Long Island asks, did
49:48: Luther in many ways bring the church back to the apostolic foundation?
49:54: Excellent point, especially since, as we mentioned in the beginning of the show, Roman Catholics continually claim that the 16th century
50:04: Reformation was an invention of the imaginations of the reformers and that they were teaching things that had never been believed in those 16 centuries prior or 15 centuries prior.
50:19: And this could not be further from the truth, because did not Luther, not only did he bring the church, or was it not his mission to bring the church back to the apostolic foundation and the scriptures, but he also, did he not use very heavily the patristic evidence that the
50:38: Roman Catholic Church had actually abandoned their own fathers in regard to their theology?
50:46: He certainly did. He certainly did. This was the desire of Luther since he became a friar in the
50:54: Augustinian monastery. This has always been the desire of Luther.
51:00: Luther has always had the good of the church as his main goal.
51:08: Luther was not a revolutionary. Luther was not a troublemaker. Luther was an ordained theologian and professor of the church who promised to teach the church the truth, to fight for the truth, and to defend the truth.
51:28: So the state of the late medieval church was abominable.
51:37: There was an extremely moralistic view of the
51:42: Christian religion that was preached and proposed by the Roman Catholic Church. There was corruption everywhere.
51:52: There was greed, things like sodomy, somewhere, in certain occasions, which were not sanctioned, which were not opposed, which were not disciplined.
52:11: So the years where Luther was placed were very, very difficult years for the church.
52:18: So Luther recovered the apostolic preaching of the cross.
52:27: Paul says, I preach Christ and him crucified alone.
52:35: I'm paraphrasing, but that's what he said. And this is what
52:40: Luther wanted to do. This is what Luther wanted to do. And this is clear from Luther's commentary on Galatians, that today is still a valuable resource for us believers, which is another very important work.
52:58: He relates in a very vivid way, in a very interesting way, the situation of Paul, that is of the apostolic church, to the situation of Luther's days.
53:14: And he makes very interesting parallels between the enemies of Paul, the
53:20: Judaizers that corrupted the gospel and deceived the minds of the simple, and the theologians and teachers and preachers of Luther's day that insisted in their semi -Pelagian, if not
53:41: Pelagian, man -centered gospel. So Luther makes this parallel in a very convincing, in a very convincing way.
53:55: And the parallel is appropriate, I think. The parallel is appropriate because as the enemies of Paul wanted to bring and to import in the gospel something external to the gospel, in the same way the adversary of Luther corrupted the gospel by making it man -centered.
54:22: You're speaking of the Judaizers in Paul's day and the great parallel between the
54:29: Judaizers and Rome, even though many on the surface would not see the connection because the
54:35: Judaizers were trying to make the church an exclusively Jewish group and with circumcision as a requirement, but the church of Rome was still adding things to faith, sacramental and otherwise, to make one fit for heaven.
54:52: Exactly. Of course, there are differences. Of course, there are formal differences between the
54:59: Judaizer of Paul's day and the Roman Catholic teachings of Luther's day.
55:08: There are significant differences that I'm not going to repeat at the moment because I think that everybody knows and you mentioned them already.
55:19: By the way, Marco, we have to go to our midway break right now, so pick up right where we left off when we return.
55:27: Okay. I know that you are going to disconnect and recall back into the studio, so we look forward to getting your phone call again.
55:35: If anybody would like to join us, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.
55:40: This is an elongated break. It's longer than most of our breaks because of the fact that the
55:46: Grace Life Radio 90 .1 FM in Lake City, Florida, requires a 12 -minute break between our two major segments, so please be patient.
55:55: Please write down all of the information that our advertisers provide so you can patronize them and also write us questions for Marco Barone about Luther and his
56:04: Augustinian theology of the cross. Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away.
56:15: We'll be right back after these messages. Iron Sharpens Iron welcomes
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56:58: For a clear, detailed professional estimate, call this trustworthy team of problem solvers who provide superior results that stand the test of time.
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59:53: Or go to BatteryDepot .com. That's BatteryDepot .com. Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune into A Visit to the
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01:00:47: He who never quotes will never be quoted. He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own.
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01:01:50: I would like to introduce you to my good friends Todd and Patty Jennings at CVBBS, which stands for Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.
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01:02:24: That means you can get to the good stuff faster. It also means that you don't have to worry about being assaulted by the pornographic, heretical, and otherwise faith insulting material promoted by the secular book vendors.
01:02:37: Their website is CVBBS .com. Browse the pages at ease, shop at your leisure, and purchase with confidence as Todd and Patty work in service to you, the church, and to Christ.
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01:03:29: Luther on the Christian Life Cross and Freedom, very similar to what we're discussing today.
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01:03:52: Also, we want to remind you about a couple of upcoming events. One of them starts tomorrow, and I will be there,
01:03:59: God willing. That is the Philadelphia Conference on Reform Theology, which is being held at Proclamation Presbyterian Church in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania.
01:04:08: That's the 27th of April through the 29th of April. The theme is The Spirit of the Age and the
01:04:13: Age of the Spirit. These speakers include my friend, who I think is the most powerful preacher of the gospel alive on the planet
01:04:21: Earth today, Conrad Mbewe, who is the pastor of Kabwatha Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia, Africa.
01:04:28: Also preaching is Richard Phillips of Second Presbyterian Church in Greenville, South Carolina. Jonathan Master, who's also been a guest here on Iron Sharpens Iron.
01:04:36: David Murray on the faculty of Puritan Reform Theological Seminary, and also Scott Oliphant, who is on the faculty of Westminster Theological Seminary in Glendale, Pennsylvania in the
01:04:47: Philadelphia area. If you would like to register, the website is alliancenet .org,
01:04:53: alliancenet .org, and please tell them at the
01:04:58: Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals that you heard about this conference from Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.
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01:08:10: Just send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com and put advertising in the subject line.
01:08:17: That's also the email address where you can send in a question to our guest Marco Barone regarding Luther's Augustinian Theology of the
01:08:24: Cross. That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. And Marco, before the break you were comparing the heresy of the
01:08:33: Judaizers with that of the Roman Catholic Church, and if you could continue where you left off. Yes, so the question was whether or not
01:08:45: Luther restored the apostolic church, the apostolic preaching of the truth.
01:08:53: And yeah, my belief is that he did. I say that Luther, like Paul, was determined not to know anything among us save Jesus Christ and him crucified.
01:09:07: So it's even a superficial reading of scripture is sufficient to see how vital and central is the preaching, the preaching of the truth, the preaching of the word, the preaching of the cross to the entire history of the revelation.
01:09:32: Not only in the New Testament where it is specifically and often present even in a historical example like Paul preaching, like Peter preaching, but also in the
01:09:44: Old Testament. So Luther desired to do this. Luther's desire and Luther's mission, or one of them, was to restore the preaching of the
01:09:55: Bible, expository, clear, biblical preaching to the people, to the church, to the church not intended in the
01:10:10: Roman Catholic way, because we know that the church in the Roman Catholic way, in the strict sense of the term, is the clergy and the clergy alone.
01:10:23: The people are the church in a so -called derivative way.
01:10:29: Luther renounces all this, rejected all this, and proved from the
01:10:35: Bible that the church is the community of the believer, all believers, ministers, non -ministers, professors, farmers, everywhere, anywhere, whatever is the calling of the person belongs to the invisible church of Christ.
01:10:56: So yes, Luther restored the preaching of the cross, and as I said, some eminent, some great examples of this are his lectures, his lectures on Romans and also his lectures on Galatians, as I said, and I mean not myself, but Luther himself makes the comparison between the
01:11:21: Judaizer of Paul's days and the theology of works that he opposed that was proposed and endorsed by his
01:11:32: Roman Catholic adversaries. And we have another question that is relevant to something we were saying earlier about the theology of glory.
01:11:49: We have Ronald in eastern Suffolk County who asks, if I'm remembering correctly, you said the erroneous theology of glory that Luther condemned meant that one could bypass the cross and enter into heaven.
01:12:09: Who was teaching this at the time of Luther? Even though the Roman Catholic church had a very heretical and apostate gospel at the time of the
01:12:19: Reformation, they still would never have claimed that you could bypass the cross and enter into heaven.
01:12:25: So who was Luther challenging and refuting by this? Luther was challenging, first of all, his closest theological neighbors.
01:12:44: There was some of his colleagues and Augustinian colleagues.
01:12:54: Then he was challenging the scholastics, and what
01:13:00: I mean with that, he was challenging the abuse of the scholastic texts in the in the seminaries and in many theological faculties, where according to him, where according to Luther, there was an excessive study of scholastics, and there was little or too little, according to Luther, study of the scripture and study of the church fathers who were more beneficial to his understanding of the scriptures.
01:13:45: In addition to Augustine, I can think of John Chrysostom, who was one of the favorites of John Calvin.
01:13:57: Regarding the question of the Catholic church, of course the Catholic church did not claim that.
01:14:04: The Catholic church still does not claim that, but I should rephrase this.
01:14:16: The Catholic church claims, and the Catholic church of the times of Luther claims not to believe these things, but in fact it does.
01:14:27: In fact it does, because as I said at the beginning, or close to the beginning, when you place, when you make the salvation of man ultimately dependent on man's decision, that's what you're doing.
01:14:45: You're bypassing the cross, because we have to remember that Luther also believed in elective grace, in sovereign grace that calls the elect out of the world.
01:15:04: So for Luther, the believers are saved, not only in time, but only in principle and in eternity, as they belong to the church elected before the foundation, the foundation of the world.
01:15:19: Of course the Roman Catholic theologian or believer or the
01:15:26: Roman Catholic theologian of the time of Luther will say, no, I do believe that the cross is essential,
01:15:34: I do believe that the cross is central, but from Luther's point of view, this is not done, this is not then believed in practice.
01:15:47: When additions are made, additions are imported in the salvific work, and in the salvific work of Jesus there is works, good works, penitence, confession, attending to mass, and whatnot.
01:16:09: So there is a difference between something that is claimed and something that is practiced.
01:16:21: You know what I mean? For example, if you, Chris, right?
01:16:27: This is just an example. If you, Chris, you keep repeating to me that you love me in Christ, but then you always treat me like rubbish.
01:16:38: I start doubting about the sincerity of your love.
01:16:46: It's the same thing with the Roman Catholic Church. We preach Christ, we preach Christ, we preach
01:16:51: Christ, but then there is overly and wrong emphasis on the sacraments.
01:17:01: It's all about the sacraments that physically, materially, confer grace to you.
01:17:07: It's all about tradition and so on and so forth.
01:17:16: Yes, I understand. Not only the Roman Catholic Church, but nearly every cult that I can think of claims that one has a salvation that is only possible by grace, and they really contradict that in their theology no matter what they say about grace.
01:17:37: Like, for instance, the Roman Catholic Church, from my knowledge, they really only vociferously protest against the two watch words of the
01:17:48: Reformation, sola scriptura and sola fide. They would claim, most of them anyway that I have had conversations with, they would claim sola gratia, but they really don't believe in sola gratia at all.
01:18:00: No, they don't. No, they don't. In fact, at the test of scripture, they don't.
01:18:08: The grace alone is the unambiguous teaching of first and second
01:18:15: Ephesians, of Romans, of Galatians, of second Thessalonians, of many, many other places.
01:18:25: And then they brought in cooperation. But if there is cooperation, and if, again, the salvific work of God ultimately depends on the man, on the person, on the human subject, because he can either reject or receive or increase this grace in a sort of mechanical way.
01:18:47: So yeah, there are claims, and then there is the test of scripture, so to speak.
01:18:54: It's a bit like, you know, the Jehovah's Witnesses. I'm not comparing the
01:19:00: Roman Catholics to the Jehovah's Witnesses, but in principle it's like that. They always tell us, oh, we believe what the
01:19:06: Bible says. Yeah, but what does the Bible say? That's the question. By the way, we have a listener from Lindenhurst, Long Island, CJ, who corrected me about you being the first person
01:19:19: I've interviewed with an Italian accent. CJ is reminding me that I interviewed
01:19:24: Simonetta Carr, who is originally from Reggio Emilia in northern
01:19:30: Italy. Do you know Simonetta Carr? She writes books about great figures from the
01:19:41: Reformation period and other periods of history for children. What's his name again?
01:19:47: It's a woman named Simonetta Carr. Carr is her married name, her
01:19:53: American name, I believe. Oh, Simonetta Carr. I know her, but not in person, but I certainly know her.
01:19:59: Yeah, and she's from Reggio Emilia, and I may be butchering that.
01:20:05: No, no, it was quite good. By the way, CJ, you're not going to win a book by just that remembering or reminding me about Simonetta Carr, so if you want to win a book, you have to write in a better question than that.
01:20:19: But I thank you anyway. Ronald in eastern
01:20:25: Suffolk County, you have won a free copy of Luther's Augustinian Theology of the Cross, so please give us your full mailing address of cvbbs .com.
01:20:35: We can ship that out to you at no cost to you or to Iron Trip and Zion Radio.
01:20:41: We're going to our final break right now. This is a very brief break. It's only going to be a couple of minutes long, and I know that my guest wants to disconnect and recall because he is calling from northern
01:20:54: Ireland, so I will let you disconnect now, and if anybody would like to join us during this last half hour, 35 minutes or so of our program, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.
01:21:07: Chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Don't go away. God willing, we will be right back after these messages from our sponsors.
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01:24:48: Solid Ground Christian Books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Paul wrote to the church at Galatia, For am
01:24:59: I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Nor am I trying to please man. If I were still trying to please man,
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01:25:19: We strive to reflect Paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how God views what we say and what we do than how men view these things.
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01:26:18: Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Welcome back, this is Chris Arnzen. If you just tuned in to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, our guest for the last 90 minutes and the final half hour to come has been and will continue to be
01:26:30: Marco Barone, and he is the author of Luther's Augustinian Theology of the
01:26:35: Cross, the Augustinianism of Martin Luther's Heidelberg Disputation, and the
01:26:40: Origins of Modern Philosophy of Religion. And our email address, if you'd like to join us on the air, is chrisarnzen at gmail .com,
01:26:49: c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the
01:26:57: USA. We have Arnie in Perry County, Pennsylvania, who says, can you please explain to our
01:27:04: Roman Catholic listeners and listeners in other religions who wrongly believe that we who believe in the doctrines of grace alone and faith alone in regard to our salvation are not saying that men may live unrepentant wicked lives and expect to go to heaven after they die?
01:27:31: One of the most common, actually, one of the most common charges against the
01:27:40: Reformation teaching of salvation by grace alone through faith alone is that that leads to immorality.
01:27:50: That the logical conclusion of that teaching is that we may live as we want.
01:27:57: We can sin so that grace may abound. But as Paul, Luther, Calvin, and all the
01:28:06: Reformers unanimously say, God forbid, that is not at all the logical conclusion of the teaching of salvation by grace alone through faith alone.
01:28:20: That is the opposite. That is the illogical conclusion of salvation by grace alone through faith alone.
01:28:29: This is because salvation is, and because salvation, broadly intended, is not only justification, that is the forensic legal declaration of the believer's righteousness in Christ and in Christ alone, but it's also regeneration.
01:28:49: Regeneration that begins a new life for the believers. A new life that is directed and dedicated to serving
01:29:02: Christ according to the rule that we have in the
01:29:07: Ten Commandments. So we are saved to the good works which were prepared before the foundation of the world for us, as Paul says in Ephesians 2.
01:29:22: We are not saved in order that we may do whatever we want because no matter what we are going to heaven.
01:29:31: No. It is not the biblical teaching that is expounded by Luther nor by Augustine.
01:29:41: The believer, the true believer, always lives a godly life.
01:29:48: This does not mean that his life is perfect. This does not mean that he never makes mistakes.
01:29:57: There are struggles in life. There are temptations. Even the best believer is not perfect, and the most righteous one falls seven times every day.
01:30:12: But nonetheless, this is a new beginning. This is a new life. The believer is a new creature because he knows and he is assured that his faith in Christ has declared him righteous in front of God.
01:30:29: He has been covered with the righteous, the perfect righteousness of Christ, and Christ has taken his blame and his guilt and his sin on the cross.
01:30:40: Therefore, on the basis of this wonderful knowledge, the believer lives a new life of gratitude to God, in love for God, to the glory of God, and for the love of the neighbor.
01:30:59: So all those who say to believe in the gospel of grace, in the gospel and teaching of grace alone through faith alone, but live a worldly life, a carnal life, a disobedient life, they do not really believe that, no matter what they claim, no matter what they say.
01:31:24: James 2, which does not teach salvation by faith and work, but teaches the external confirmation that always flows from the true salvation, the salvation of a true believer.
01:31:50: So this is what salvation by grace alone and faith alone means.
01:31:58: It doesn't mean we are passive, we are, so to speak, absolutely passive in the sense that, okay, we are now saved,
01:32:08: I believed, now I'm going back to the pub and doing whatever I want and swearing and fornicating.
01:32:18: No, no, no, this is not what Paul teaches, this is not what
01:32:24: Augustine teaches, this is not what Luther teaches, this is not what Reformation teaches, nor is a consequence of what they teach.
01:32:36: It's rather the opposite. This is the enemy of the Reformation teaching. This is antinomianism.
01:32:42: The true gospel always unites justification and sanctification.
01:32:52: They are united but distinguished. Sanctification always flows out of justification.
01:33:02: There are two different processes. The one is once and for all justification, the believers, the believer believes, and then sanctification is an ongoing process, the ongoing process of gradual sanctification that will never be completed but with death.
01:33:27: So no, that is not what the biblical gospel and the
01:33:34: Reformation gospel implies. Antinomianism is the enemy of Luther's teaching, of Calvin's teaching, of the
01:33:44: Reformation teachings, as it is of Paul's teaching and the Bible's teaching. Thank you.
01:33:52: We have a listener in Hilltop Lakes, Texas, Linda, who says, let's see here, uh, have you read
01:34:03: Eric Metaxas's book, Martin Luther, The Man Who Rediscovered God and Changed the
01:34:11: World? If so, what do you think of it? Her husband,
01:34:17: Glenn, found it fascinating. I know the book.
01:34:24: I have not read it. The books on Luther are so many that an entire life is not sufficient to read them all.
01:34:35: But I've read the book, sorry, but I've heard of the book. Actually, Professor David Engelsman read the book and he judged it positively.
01:34:50: He liked it. So, but more than this, I cannot offer, um,
01:34:57: I cannot offer more than this. I'm sorry. As far as I heard, it's a good book, though. Oh, that's good.
01:35:03: I'm pleasantly surprised to hear that. Not that, uh, not that I don't think Eric Metaxas is, uh, not a, um, a very brilliant man.
01:35:15: I have much to admire in Eric Metaxas. In fact, I envy his interviewing gifts.
01:35:22: I think that he is a superb, uh, talk show host, both on television and radio.
01:35:30: And he has a lot of qualities I admire. But the thing, the main thing that I have in opposition to Eric Metaxas, that I'm aware of anyway, is that he is very outspoken about his ecumenical views with the
01:35:47: Church of Rome. And, uh, in fact, he wrote a book called
01:35:54: Seven Men that he pays tribute to. And one of those men is
01:35:59: Pope John Paul II. The other is Charles Coulson.
01:36:05: Now, Charles Coulson, there was a lot to admire in him, too. Basically, Eric Metaxas is the heir apparent to Charles Coulson's ministry that took the position after Charles Coulson went home to be with the
01:36:22: Lord. But sadly, Charles Coulson was also an outspoken ecumenist with Rome and was the chief architect,
01:36:30: I believe, of the Evangelicals and Catholics Together Peace Treaty, which undermined, seriously undermined, differences in the gospel believed by Roman Catholics and Evangelicals.
01:36:46: Yes. That, uh, that treaty, that, uh, document or agreement,
01:36:54: Roman Catholics and Evangelicals Together was a disgrace for the
01:37:00: Protestant world in general. Right. Yeah. I want to clarify that Professor Engelsman's judgment was limited to the book.
01:37:11: Right. Yes. And I'm not saying that his book on Martin Luther, because I haven't read it, so his book on Martin Luther might be excellent.
01:37:18: But there is the impression I got, too, about dear
01:37:24: Mr. Metaxas. He's a very good communicator. He's a very good journalist. Very good sense of humor.
01:37:31: Very good sense of humor. Very, very nice person. But a bad theologian. Yeah, yeah.
01:37:38: And just because someone might have, personally, might have bad theology doesn't mean they can't be an accurate historian.
01:37:45: In fact, the classic book on Martin Luther, Here I Stand by Roland Baten. Roland Baten was not a conservative evangelical by any stretch of the imagination, but he still wrote a very accurate historical account of Martin Luther's life.
01:38:02: And I would love, actually, to have a debate with Eric Metaxas on this program, or have somebody debate
01:38:10: Eric in a friendly way, but a serious way, nonetheless, on ecumenism with Rome, and would love to.
01:38:18: In fact, I think Linda has given me more motivation to try to accomplish that and to arrange such a debate.
01:38:25: Whether or not he'll agree, I have no idea. But Linda, please give us your full mailing address in Hilltop Lakes, Texas, so that we can mail you, or CVBBS .com
01:38:34: can mail you a free copy of Luther's Augustinian Theology of the Cross.
01:38:40: Thank you so much for contributing to the program today with an excellent question. And CJ from Lindenhurst, Long Island has a real question now, other than just reminding me of Simonetta Carr, which actually wasn't a question, it was a comment.
01:38:55: CJ says that the subtitle of your book involves the origins of the modern philosophy of religion.
01:39:06: Can you please explain how Martin Luther's Augustinianism was the origins of modern philosophy of religion?
01:39:18: Yes. Well, with the origins of the modern philosophy of religion,
01:39:27: I mean this. Luther, on the basis of the
01:39:33: Bible and on the basis of Augustine's teaching, he recognized a truth, that is, that every time we give in our doing theology, every time that in our doing theology we give priority, we give authority to what we call reason.
01:40:00: And with reason we don't mean simply the reasoning well, which is required by everybody.
01:40:08: We don't really, we don't only mean logic. We have to be logical.
01:40:15: The creeds of the Reformation are written in a logical, clear, and often syllogistic way.
01:40:24: No, with reason is not only meant that. With reason is meant what appears theologically or ethically good to man, to man considering himself in his fallenness, in his sinful state, after the original sin.
01:40:46: Now, Luther saw that every time we give priority to, and every time we focus in our doing theology, in our reading and thinking about the
01:40:58: Bible, every time we give priority and we focus on what man finds reasonable, we always end up in a
01:41:09: Pelagianism, or semi -Pelagianism in the best case. That's always the conclusion of what
01:41:23: Kant, what Immanuel Kant calls the religion within the limits of pure reason.
01:41:31: This is not because it's the most reasonable conclusion, but that's because men naturally reject what the
01:41:43: Bible teaches about the original sin. What the Bible teaches about salvation by grace alone.
01:41:53: We, there was a theologian who said, I think it was Sproul, I think it was
01:41:58: R .C. Sproul who said that we are Pelagian by nature. Yes.
01:42:06: I apologize to the theologian who said that in case he was not now with the
01:42:12: Lord R .C. Sproul. Yeah, I know that Charles Spurgeon said that we're all Arminian by nature.
01:42:18: Oh, okay. But your quote may be accurate as well. Yeah, yeah.
01:42:24: That's kind of very similar too. So this is what
01:42:29: Luther understood when reason is misused, when the ethical expectation and ethical and theological demands of fallen men are imposed over the
01:42:48: Bible, are even read sometimes in the Bible. The result is always a sort of work salvation.
01:42:56: Then there may be differences. There may be differences between semi -Pelagianism and Arminianism.
01:43:03: There may be differences between the Pelagianism and what the Roman Catholic Church proposed at the time of Luther, but the essence is the same.
01:43:13: There is work salvation. There is man -centered gospel. There is adding your own spontaneous works to the atoning work of Christ.
01:43:27: And in order to prove that in my book, I have analyzed the philosophy of religion and the theology of two giants of modern philosophy,
01:43:39: Immanuel Kant and Leibniz, who claimed to be
01:43:50: Protestants. They really were not.
01:43:56: I mean, they were in the church, but they did not really believe what their confessions, especially in the case of Leibniz, who explicitly was proud to say to be a
01:44:12: Lutheran, but he really was not. He rejected the biblical teaching of original sin and the biblical teaching of the bondage of the will to sin.
01:44:24: So Kant and Leibniz do exactly this. They try to find a religion that is in accordance to reason.
01:44:36: But we reason, they don't mean they try to make the faith, the teaching of the
01:44:43: Bible reasonable, because that's what we conservative reformed Protestant believers do too.
01:44:49: We study the Bible, we make sense of it. We expound it in a logical and reasonable way.
01:44:56: We show its rationality. We deepen into it.
01:45:02: We enjoy in understanding and discovering how reasonable, how beneficial, how harmonious is the teaching of the
01:45:15: Bible. Is the Fides Querens Intellectum, the
01:45:23: Anselm thought. That means faith seeks understanding.
01:45:29: No, this is not what Leibniz and Kant look for in a theology of grace.
01:45:37: They want to adequate, they want to adapt what they believe is reasonable.
01:45:50: They want to adapt the Bible to what they believe is reasonable. And you know, it happens that what is reasonable is always worth salvation.
01:46:01: So Luther saw this, and I think Kant and Leibniz confirmed this guess, this prophecy,
01:46:11: I call it in the book by Luther. So this is the more philosophical chapter of my book, but I think it's still very relevant to what we have said.
01:46:25: Amen. Well, C .J., you have now, this time, won a free copy of the book we are addressing,
01:46:32: Luther's Augustinian Theology of the Cross, by our guest Marco Barone. So please make sure we have your full mailing address in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, so that CVBBS .com
01:46:43: can ship a free copy of that book out to you. I want to make sure, before we take any more listener questions, that you summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners in regard to Luther's Augustinian Theology of the
01:47:00: Cross, and then if we have time after you give us the summary, we will take some more listener questions.
01:47:10: I think that the main point that I have tried to make in the book is that, or at least one of the main points is,
01:47:24: I'm probably repeating myself, but this is it, is the centrality of the cross for a functional life, not only for a functional and blessed intellectual life, but also for a functional and blessed ethical life, moral life, so to speak.
01:47:47: Luther saw this, and Augustine, too, saw this. Augustine, on one side, he thanks the
01:47:58: Platonists, for example, for helping him getting out of the materialistic misconceptions of the
01:48:08: Manichaeists. On the other side, he said, Augustine is like, he said, there is no real happiness with, there is no real intellectual satisfaction, intellectual gain in Platonists, because they do not have the
01:48:23: Word, they do not have the Logos Incarnate, they do not have Christ. There is no mention of Christ, he says, in their works.
01:48:31: And Luther says something similar. We can speculate about God as much as we want.
01:48:38: Luther says we can engage in the doctrine of God as much as we want, that's important.
01:48:46: As a classical theist, as a classical theist, I am convinced of the importance, of the vital importance of these teachings.
01:48:56: But he says, but if we don't have Christ, if we don't believe in Christ, if we reject the cross of Christ, all our works, intellectual works of speculation, or works trying to gain grace or merit, it's all in vain.
01:49:17: This is, I think, what we can take, or at least in a nutshell, of Luther's theology of the cross.
01:49:31: Praise God. Let's see, let me take a couple more questions from our listeners while we still have time.
01:49:40: Can you please give a contrast between a philosopher and a theologian?
01:49:53: That's quite a general question, because it depends.
01:49:59: There are theologians and theologians and philosophers and philosophers. There are excellent
01:50:06: Christian philosophers in the world who base their philosophy on the
01:50:11: Scripture. There are very bad theologians on the world who say to base, to ground their theology on the
01:50:20: Scripture, but they don't. And vice versa, there are very good theologians and there are very bad philosophers.
01:50:28: So it really depends. But in general, assuming that the theologian is a sound
01:50:37: Bible -believing Protestant and Reformed theologian, and the philosopher is a sound
01:50:47: Christian Reformed believing philosopher, the difference is that the theologian, then there is a difference, of course.
01:51:01: There is the theologian that focuses on systematic theology or on biblical theology or on commenting the
01:51:10: Bible. But in general, the theologian systematizes in an understandable, comprehensive way the teaching of the
01:51:20: Bible. And that can take different forms, systematic theology, biblical theology, commentaries, commenting or lecturing on a book.
01:51:30: The philosopher, the Christian philosopher, applies and deduces the philosophical conclusions of what is the biblical teaching.
01:51:46: For example, for ethics. For example, for metaphysics, how
01:51:53: God interacts with his creation. And for example, for epistemology, how do we know things?
01:52:03: How do we know what is outside of us? And so on and so forth.
01:52:12: For example, in this, some scholastics are quite helpful when they offer their metaphysics of God.
01:52:24: Scholasticism, medieval scholasticism, is not to be demonized. It has to be acknowledged, its usefulness in certain parts, especially in certain individuals, such as Anselm, Bernard of Clairvaux, Thomas Aquinas on certain points.
01:52:52: So they are quite useful in that. They offer some interesting and very often very solid philosophical material for a sound
01:53:04: Christian worldview that maybe sometimes, maybe the theologian is not or does not offer.
01:53:14: And the same Augustine, the same Augustine, who was a philosopher and a theologian at the same time.
01:53:21: Now do you think, in regard to a philosopher that is practicing his trade in a wrongful way, or at least in some part he steers off the course, do you think that sometimes philosophers, and I've noticed this with Arminian philosophers especially, that they will attempt to reserve their teaching to the logical conclusions that they come to through human reasoning?
01:54:08: And they will, of course, if they're a Christian, use the scriptures, but they tend not to really connect the whole council of God together very well.
01:54:17: Like, for instance, an Arminian philosopher might say something like, if God has ordained before the foundation of the world all who will be saved, then therefore we would conclude that Christians don't need to evangelize anyone because they're going to be saved anyway.
01:54:36: That would be like the wrongful conclusion of a philosopher who is not really practicing his trade correctly.
01:54:43: Am I off base here, or what would your comment be? No, actually, sadly, I think that you are not misrepresenting the general trade, especially when it comes to Arminian philosophers.
01:55:01: In my doctoral dissertation, I have addressed two very famous Arminian theologians,
01:55:16: Jerry Walsh and Timothy O 'Connor, and they have written two articles who appeared in a book called
01:55:27: Free Will and Faith, published by Oxford University Press, and they gave in these two articles arguments why
01:55:43: Calvinism is wrong, why it's biblically wrong, and why it's philosophically wrong.
01:55:51: Interestingly, though, they base their entire arguments on a truly
01:56:00: Arminian reading of the Bible. So, do you see that that entirely begs the question?
01:56:09: Because the question is, is the Arminian libertarian teaching of the
01:56:15: Bible the real one, or is it not? I am convinced it is not.
01:56:22: So, while Professor Walsh and Professor O 'Connor almost rejoice in the logical validity of their arguments, the very premises of those arguments, that is, the very foundation of the arguments, is wrong.
01:56:48: So, do you know what I mean? If we start from false premises, the argument itself, the logical argument itself, may be sound, may be valid, but it's not sound because the premises are not true.
01:57:04: So, this is the importance why the philosopher needs to know good, sound, reformed theology.
01:57:13: And we are out of time, brother. We are out of time. I'm sorry. I want to make sure that our listeners have your contact information, philosophyofthecross .blogspot
01:57:24: .com. That's philosophyofthecross .blogspot .com. And I know that people in the
01:57:31: UK can order your book from the website of the
01:57:37: Covenant Protestant Reformed Church, correct, in Northern Ireland? No, not my book,
01:57:43: Pastor McGill's book. Oh, okay. Yeah, but my book is available on Wordery and Book Depository and Amazon.
01:57:54: Okay, great. Well, since I mentioned Covenant Protestant Reformed Church's website,
01:58:00: I might as well bring it up. It's cprf .co .uk, C -P for Covenant Protestant, R -F for Reformed, and I'm not sure why the letter
01:58:12: F is in there, F as in Frank, .co
01:58:18: .uk. You could also order Marco Barone's book from cvbbs .com,
01:58:24: C -V for Cumberland Valley, B -B -S for BibleBookService .com. If they don't have it in stock, they will order it for you.
01:58:31: And let's not forget our friends at the Reformed Witness Hour who are clients of mine.
01:58:38: They have a radio broadcast that you can find out more about by going to reformedwitnesshour .org,
01:58:44: reformedwitnesshour .org, and you can find out what radio stations are airing that program all over the world.
01:58:56: And the Reform Free Publishing Association that also publishes
01:59:02: Cold to Watch for Christ's Return by Martin McGill, who we mentioned earlier, that is rfpa .org,
01:59:10: R -F for Reform Free, P -A for PublishingAssociation .org.
01:59:16: Thank you so much, Marco Barone. I look forward to having you back on the program very soon and very often.
01:59:22: I want to thank everybody who listened, especially those who wrote in questions, and I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater