Desiderius Erasmus Roterdamus (1466/9-1536)

   Desiderius Erasmus Roterdamus is not a lately discovered dinosaur; he was a reformation era scholar.  Erasmus was arguably the greatest scholar of the sixteenth century.  His work in languages was instrumental in the first published Greek New Testament, which led to more accurate translations of the Bible in English and German.  Both as a linguist and as a scholar of theology, Erasmus represents one of the most important figures in reformation history. 

  Theologically, or should we say politically-religiously, Erasmus was a non-combatant in the reformation.  He represents one of the few figures of his day who refused to become embroiled in most of the doctrinal divide.  (He would later become involved in Free Will discussions).  All of his critiques were more or less aimed at actions, not the idea of a hierarchical Church or the Pope.  In the truest sense of the word, Erasmus was a reformer (unlike Luther) because he believed that the Catholic Church was worth saving.

    Initially Erasmus praised Luther, calling him “a mighty trumpet of gospel truth” and  said that “it is clear that many of the reforms for which Luther calls are urgently needed.”1 As a result, Luther praised Erasmus for his scholarship and asked him to join the Lutheran Party. After being rejected, Luther claimed that Erasmus was a coward.  Erasmus was called many names by both sides because of his position of neutrality.  He believed that to join either the Catholic or Reformation’s doctrinal debate would harm scholarly community.  He said, “I detest dissension because it goes both against the teachings of Christ and against a secret inclination of nature. I doubt that either side in the dispute can be suppressed without grave loss.”2

   Though Erasmus did not involve himself in most of the doctrinal debate, he did believe many of the tenets of the Catholic tradition, claiming that Mary was a perpetual virgin and that the apocrypha was a part of the Bible.  For these beliefs, Luther called him “the very mouth and organ of the devil.”3

   Erasmus’s work De libero arbitrio diatribe sive collatio (Of free will: Discourses; or, Comparisons) was a response to Luther’s views on predestination.  Erasmus argued a middle ground between grace and free will.  This would lead to a rather interesting addition to the formation of Protestantism.  Luther’s response, De Servo Arbitrio (On the bondage of the Will) would become his most well-known writing. 

Application: 

  How do we use Erasmus' example to apply to our own lives?  In order to understand this we must begin with his book Enchiridion militis Christiani (Handbook of a Christian Knight) where he tells soldiers to live by the Christian faith and not the rites of religion.  He claims that we are all soldiers for God from baptism.  This idea is essential to our lives as Christians and, even more so, as intellectual Christians because we are like soldiers in a small army facing an enemy with many soldiers.  Essentially, we are entering the territory of Satan by engaging in Christian intellectual issues.

  We must also sometimes take Erasmus’ stance on issues facing the Church.  We cannot fight everything we disagree with; neutrality is sometimes necessary and advantageous to the Church.  But when certain issues face us, we must fight as Erasmus did in the case of free will.  It’s also better to respond to contention as Erasmus did.  “But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. (Matthew 5:39, NIV)


1.  Galli, Mark, andm, Olsen, Ted. 131 Christians Everyone Should Know. Nashville: Holman Reference, 2000, p. 344.  
2.  Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of Christianity. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1953, p. 661. 
3.  D. Martin Luther. Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Briefwechsel, vol. 7, Weimar: Böhlau, pp. 27-40.

New Series: Christian Intellectuals

I will begin a series that profiles Christian intellectuals throughout the Christian tradition.  I’ll provide a brief biography of their lives, ideas and works as well as an essential application to our own lives.  I hope that these profiles will provide you with a brief history of the Christian intellectual tradition as well as help you to learn more about some interesting “unknown” scholars.

What is theology?

     Theology is the study of God and religion.  Christian theology then is the study of the Christian God and the Christian religion.  I really like the way Alister McGrath further develops the definition of theology in "Christian Theology: An Introduction"; he does so by including four stages to the study of theology: sources, development, relationship and application.  Sources may include the Bible, natural revelation, the Church or the church fathers.  Development deals with the way in which theology develops, i.e. its evolutionary history into what it is today.   This is a lot like historical theology in its approach to new ideas.  Relationship is how Christian ideas relate with each other and their total coherence.  Finally, application is about theology’s pragmatic value to believers and theologians.  (McGrath, 2011)  McGrath’s definition gives a good foundation for studying God and religion because it gives us four places to begin our study.  (You can checkout part of his book in the links.)  We must start with the revelation, watch the idea develop, watch the relation of the idea to others and finally check its applicability.  I will attempt to use this structure in discussing theology.

  An important question related to the first things…

  “How do we study theology?  What tools should we bring to the table to further our understanding?”  Many wide and varied suggestions have been made.  Indeed, this is quite possibly one of the seminal questions facing modern theology.  Some have argued that we must look at theology in a completely scientific way.  Others have suggested that we must attack the questions with only logic.   Both of these approaches come down to a basic idea that theology must be some kind of scientific study of religion. 

I believe this approach has many problems – one of which is focus. 

      For example, while science may be able to study the way civilizations think about God, it doesn’t have anything to do with the metaphysical relationship people have with a spiritual world.  To think that science is a necessary prerequisite to studying theology is arbitrary, not only because it isn’t pragmatic, but also because it means that religion must somehow subjugate itself to science.  Which ultimately means that we are studying religion under a microscope (like studying an ancient text) and that we have closed our eyes to anything outside of our visual stimuli.  This, I think, most theologians would reject because religion isn’t like any other subject; it is tied to something deeper than the mere flesh and bones that make up our body, it is tied to our being.  Many theologians have sold their metaphorical souls for legitimization of theology in the eyes of others and by doing so they have put blinders over the study of theology.

    I believe that this approach is wrong; my suggestion is that we approach theology with an open heart and mind.  We must approach it not merely as scholars but as believers. What I mean is that we must use all available paths to understand more about God and religion.  In this way, I guess I’m like Søren Kierkegaard, we live in a society that wants to study religion with a microscope, but we cannot study spirituality with anything but an open heart.

McGrath, A.E. (2011). Christian theology: an introduction. Chichester, West Sussex, UK: John Wiley & Sons. 

Who is Wolfhart?

Who is Woflhart?

     Wolfhart is the first name of famous theologian Wolfhart Pannenberg.  I named the blog after his rather excellent first name, not because he was the greatest theologian, but because he was the the theologian with the greatest name.  This blog is not about Wolfhart, but it is about his passion that is theology. 

   The charger in the name of this blog has nothing to do with electronics, sports, etc.  A charger was a steed who bore knights during the middle ages.  So, even though some of you may have thought I had become an electronic device...I remain a mere human.  

Mission Statement

    It is my hope in this blog to discuss issues that face modern Christian thinkers and give them creative solutions both traditionally theological and non-traditional  in nature.  In other words, I want to burnish a dialogue on theology for religious thinkers as outer and inner pressures affect modern Christianity.  I will discuss what it means to be a Christian intellectual in a world that rejects Christ.