Download or read book The Principle of Protestantism written by Philip Schaff and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2004-05-03 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This series is the first modern edition of the main body of Mercersburg theology. It includes all the important works, large and small, of John W. Nevin, Philip Schaff, and lesser Mercersburg figures, covering the significant doctrines and issues of the movement. Each volume includes critical or explanatory notes, relevant introductions, and bibliographies of modern works. With few exceptions, the early texts are reproduced in unabridged form. Since the original Mercersburg materials are now extremely scarce, and almost impossible to assemble in their entirety, the Lancaster Series forms an invaluable resource for historians of American Christianity and, in particular, for serious students of theology. It will commend itself to all those who wish to understand the nineteenth-century background of contemporary Protestantism. Both of the Mercersburg theologians, Schaff and Nevin, looked forward to a new age of the church - an age which would call into unity and catholicity all the divisions of the body of Christ.

Download or read book The Mercersburg Theology written by James Hastings Nichols and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2004-01-08 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Mercersburg theology was a protest against many of the ÒPuritan tendencies dominant in American religion in the mid-nineteenth century. Its spokesmen emphasized the catholic heritage in Protestantism and fostered the ecumenical hope of a reunion of Protestantism, Roman Catholicism, and Orthodoxy. They presented a high church sacramental conception, as opposed to the predominant revivalistic, individualistic, and sectarian habit of mind. The movement was generally disapproved as Romanizing and its popular influence was accordingly minimal. The two creative writers were John Williamson Nevin, the theologian, and Philip Schaff, the historian and liturgical scholar, who taught together at the college and seminary of the German Reformed Church at Mercersburg, Pennsylvania. Their books, tracts, and periodical articles had only a limited circulation and are no longer generally accessible, having been little regarded in the intervening years. The general stance of the Mercersburg men was parallel to that of the high church Lutherans of Germany and the Tractarians in the Church of England. The movement was the chief American counterpart to these developments, since the American Episcopalian disciples of the Tractarians could scarcely be compared to Nevin and Schaff in theological stature. The Americans were more philosophically oriented than the Anglo-Catholics, utilizing the concepts of Schelling and Hegel to interpret the classical doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation and to define the relation of private judgment to Church tradition. They were also mediators to America of much of the mid-nineteenth-century German theological scholarship. The Americans were also more conscious than the Tractarians of the implications for theology of the new historical consciousness prevalent in Germany. Schaff set forth the idea of the historical development in the same year as Newman's famous essay on the subject. But while the conception undercut the Tractarian position for Newman, the Mercersburg theology was built upon a parallel view. The evangelical catholicism of Mercersburg was most widely influential through the liturgy produced under Schaff's leadership, which has maintained a limited local continuity to this day.

Download or read book A Companion to the Mercersburg Theology written by William B. Evans and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2019-05-09 with total page 115 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume tells the story of a mid-nineteenth-century theological movement emanating from the small German Reformed Seminary in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania, where John Williamson Nevin and Philip Schaff taught. There they explored themes--such as the centrality of the incarnation for theology, the importance of the church as the body of Christ and the sphere of salvation, liturgical and sacramental worship, and the organic historical development of the church and its doctrines--that continue to resonate today with many who seek a deeper and more historically informed expression of the Christian faith that is both evangelical and catholic.

Download or read book The Mercersburg Theology and the Quest for Reformed Catholicity written by W. Bradford Littlejohn and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 197 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the mid nineteenth century, Reformed churchmen John Nevin and Philip Schaff launched a fierce attack on the reigning subjectivist and rationalist Protestantism of their day, giving birth to what is known as the "Mercersburg Theology." Their attempt to recover a high doctrine of the sacraments and the visible Church, among other things, led them into bitter controversy with Charles Hodge of Princeton Seminary, as well as several other prominent contemporaries. This book examines the contours of the disagreement between Mercersburg and Hodge, focusing on four loci in particular-Christology, ecclesiology, sacramentology, and church history. W. Bradford Littlejohn argues that, despite certain weaknesses in their theological method, the Mercersburg men offered a more robust and historically grounded paradigm for the Reformed faith than did Hodge. In the second part of the book, Littlejohn explores the value of the Mercersburg Theology as a bridgehead for ecumenical dialogue, uncovering parallels between Nevin's thought and prominent themes in Anglican, Catholic, and Orthodox theology, as well as recent debates within Reformed theology. This thorough study of one of the most creative movements in American theology offers an alluring vision of the quest for Reformed catholicity that is more relevant today than ever.

Download or read book A Treatise on Mercersburg Theology written by Samuel Miller and published by . This book was released on 1866 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Mercersburg Theology Inconsistent with Protestant and Reformed Doctrine written by Benjamin Shroder Schneck and published by . This book was released on 1874 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Worship and Reformed Theology written by Jack M. Maxwell and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 1976-01-01 with total page 498 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blame us not if we value our liturgy: It embodies the anthems of Saints; it thrills the heart with the dying songs of the faithful; it is hallowed with the blood of martyrs; it glows with sacred fire. -J. S. Foulk It is impossible to take the little finger of liturgy without grasping the whole fist of theology! -Gerardus van der Leeuw

Download or read book The Power of the Church written by John Williamson Nevin and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2020-07-29 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume is a collection of essays on the early creeds by John Nevin and Philip Schaff, the two principal representatives of the Mercersburg Theology that was birthed in nineteenth-century Pennsylvania. It also contains a critical response by John Proudfit, a more traditionally scholastic Calvinist. In these essays Nevin and Schaff argued that the early creeds provide an indispensable lens through which the Bible should be interpreted and an essential bond to preserve the unity of the church through the centuries. According to these Mercersburg theologians the liturgical and confessional use of the early creeds is crucial for shaping the identity of Christians and mediating the life of Christ to believers. Nevin and Schaff’s enthusiasm for the creeds was a function of their understanding of Christianity as an evolving tradition, the Christian life as growth in Christ-likeness, the church as the nurturing body of Christ, and the sacraments as conduits of Christ’s vivifying personhood. These convictions stood in sharp contrast to the a-creedal sensibilities of most nineteenth-century American Protestants who emphasized the sufficiency of Scripture alone, the church as a gathered community of like-minded individuals, dramatic conversion experiences, and the direct presence of Christ to the individual soul.

Download or read book Speculative Theology and Common Sense Religion written by Linden J. DeBie and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2008-05-15 with total page 131 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evangelicals in nineteenth-century America had a headquarters at Princeton. Charles Hodge never expected that a former student of Princeton and his own replacement during his hiatus in Europe, John W. Nevin, would lead the German Reformed Church's seminary in a new, and in his mind, destructive direction. The two, along with their institutions, would clash over philosophy and religion, producing some of the best historical theology ever written in the United States. The clash was broad, influencing everything from hermeneutics to liturgy, but at its core was the philosophical antagonism of Princeton's Scottish common-sense perspective and the German speculative method employed by Mercersburg. Both Princeton and Mercersburg were the cautious and critical beneficiaries of a century of European Protestant science, philosophy, and theology, and they were intent on adapting that legacy to the American religious context. For Princeton, much of the new European thought was suspect. In contrast, Mercersburg embraced a great deal of what the Continent offered.Princeton followed a conservative path, never straying far from the foundation established by Locke. They enshrined an evangelical perspective that would become a bedrock for conservative Protestants to this day. In contrast, Nevin and the Mercersburg school were swayed by the advances in theological science made by Germany's mediating school of theology. They embraced a churchy idealism called evangelical catholicism and emphatically warned that the direction of Princeton and with it Protestant American religion and politics, would grow increasingly subjective, thus divided and absorbed with individual salvation. They cautioned against the spirit of the growing evangelical bias toward personal religion as it led to sectarian disunity and they warned evangelicals not to confuse numerical success with spiritual success. In contrast, Princeton was alarmed at the direction of European philosophy and theology and they resisted Mercersburg with what today continues to be the fundamental teachings of evangelical theology. Princeton's appeal was in its common-sense philosophical moorings, which drew rapidly industrializing America into its arms. Mercersburg countered with a philosophically defended, churchly idealism based on a speculative philosophy that effectively critiqued what many to this day find divisive and dangerous about America's current Religious Right.

Download or read book The Mercersburg Review written by and published by . This book was released on 1859 with total page 660 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Romanticism in American Theology written by James Hastings Nichols and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a study of religious thought and life in America in the generation before the Civil War. It focuses on Nevin and Schaff, who pioneered in America the theological reinterpretations stimulated by German idealism in philosophy and the new theories of historical development. They were also spokesmen of the romantic interest in Christian traditions, community, and sacraments and in this interest opposed the antihistorical individualism predominant in American religion. Charles Hodge, Orestes Brownson, Horace Bushnell, R. J. Wilberforce, and the American Lutherans all debated with them. Nevin and Schaff were the chief nineteenth-century American prophets of the contemporary ecumenical movement.

Download or read book The Mercersburg Theology written by John I. Swander and published by . This book was released on 1909 with total page 316 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Development of the Church written by Philip Schaff and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2017-01-19 with total page 425 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Philip Schaff, the founder of church history in America, was widely celebrated in his later career. Soon after his arrival from Germany, however, his Principle of Protestantism (1845) was stiffly denounced for its favorable attitude toward Roman Catholicism, harsh critique of denominationalism, and theory of historical progress leading to a church that would be both Evangelical and Catholic. Charles Hodge's review of the book provided the most cogent analysis of its implications for American Christianity. Schaff further clarified his understanding of progress in What Is Church History? (1846) and "German Theology and the Church Question" (1853). Together, these early writings of the Mercersburg theology set forth the parameters of what later generations would call the ecumenical movement. This edition carefully preserves these texts while providing extensive introductions, annotations, bibliography, and a glossary of key names to orient the reader and facilitate further scholarship. The Mercersburg Theology Study Series presents attractive, readable, scholarly, modern editions of the key writings of the nineteenth-century theological movement led by Philip Schaff and John Nevin. It aims to introduce the academic community and the broader public more fully to Mercersburg's unique blend of American and European, Reformed and Catholic theology.

Download or read book Catholic and Reformed written by Charles Yrigoyen Jr. and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 1978-01-01 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The place of the Mercersburg Theology in American religious history has been widely recognized.... It is usually viewed as one of the unique movements in 19th century American Protestantism, principally because it challenged many of the prevailing theological ideas and practices of the time. Two surveys of American religious history have described it as a "theologically and liturgically creative high church movement" (Robert T. Handy) and as the "most creative manifestation of the Catholic tendency" (Sydney E. Ahlstrom) among 19th century American Protestants.

Download or read book A Treatise on Mercersburg Theology Or Mercersburg and Modern Theology Compared written by Samuel Miller and published by Theclassics.Us. This book was released on 2013-09 with total page 20 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1866 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER IV. 19.--THE OFFICE OF THE MINISTRY. HE office of the ministry, according to modern theology, is not invested with functions commensurate with the divine and supernatural facts and realities with which it has to deal, and in whose service it has been instituted. It has no power to bind the conscience of men in matters of faith and practice, being clothed with no binding power of any kind. However well a man may be accredited as a minister of Jesus Christ, he is, in no real sense, the organ through which Christ speaks, whose words and official acts are to be accepted in good faith, as beirfg in accordance with his instructions. Instead of such faith in his favor, or rather in favor of the truth he represents, in the premises, he must allow those to whom he is accredited, the advantage of entertaining a doubt in what he says, until he convinces them by documentary or other evidences, that he is not misrepresenting the truth, of which they themselves are to be the judges. He has, accordingly, no right to expect, for instance, that even the children of the Church should believe the Creed, until he has convinced their understanding, that its contents agree with the teaching of the Bible; and not even to believe in the Bible itself, until he has proved to them that it is the word of God; and that God's Word is something which they must accept by faith unconditionally, without asking any farther troublesome questions. But as he is not allowed to make any such demand in the premises, he will have some considerable difficulty to find the point where the unconditional faith comes in spontaneously, from which he can proceed to build them up in the faith and knowledge of the truth. This whole view of the office of the ministry is...

Download or read book TREATISE ON MERCERSBURG THEOLO written by Samuel 1815-1873 Miller and published by Wentworth Press. This book was released on 2016-08-29 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Download or read book The Mercersberg Theology written by John I. Swander and published by . This book was released on 1909 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: