The weakest link in the CENI hermeneutical chain is that of inferences. This is usually described as “necessary inferences.” In Thomas Campbell’s Declaration and Address, the sixth proposition states:
That although inferences and deductions from Scripture premises, when fairly inferred, may be truly called the doctrine of God’s holy word, yet are they not formally binding upon the consciences of Christians farther than they perceive the connection, and evidently see that they are so; for their faith must not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power and veracity of God. Therefore, no such deductions can be made terms of communion, but do properly belong to the after and progressive edification of the Church. Hence, it is evident that no such deductions or inferential truths ought to have any place in the Church’s confession.
On the one hand, Campbell says that properly-made inferences can be called “the doctrine of God’s holy word,” he insists that they must not be made a test of fellowship. Why? Because they are what he calls “wisdom of men.”
Even the most ardent supporters of CENI as a hermeneutic squirm a bit as they describe the proper use of inferences. Which ones are necessary? How far are we willing to go with those inferences?
Many advocate the use of “common sense” in the making of inferences (as well as other aspects of CENI). To the modernist mind, this works. Logic. Common sense. That’s how you arrive at answers.
It’s strange to me that many of the same people are uncomfortable with any inclusion of the Holy Spirit in the process. We can pray for understanding, but that means that God gives us the common sense we need, they would argue.
To my eye, this is where the CENI hermeneutic’s mask of objectivity gets ripped away. More than necessary inferences, we tend to make desired inferences. If the inference supports the point we want to make, then it’s “necessary.” If not, it’s “going too far.”
Am I being too harsh? Should we give inferences an equal place at the table? Under what guidelines? How do we know what’s a “necessary inference” and what’s a “desired inference”?
I don’t know. I really don’t. I would propose that a “necessary” inference is one that, without which, the whole enterprise is pointless. The typical one I’m considering is the fact that none of these documents in the NT was addressed to me and my family. So, supposedly, it is necessary to infer something in order for me to appreciate them as authoritative for my own life.
But is it, really?
i’m on board with the sentiments so far that CENI is quite faulty. And i even see how Campbell’s quote shows that the conservative CoC’s have certain diverged from his intent.
But surely Campbell is just plain wrong that one’s personal understanding of any given NI is a necessary condition for his being culpable to that NI! As Nick pointed out, there’s a sense in which very little if anything is not a matter of inference. Are we really going to say that a person who genuinely can’t or has yet to apprehend the inference that commands/teachings regarding lying or polygamy *apply to him,* he is therefore not culpable when he commits those acts or that we have no basis for claiming that our fellowship with him is affected by his commission of those acts?
Campbell’s caveat here seems to have some very, very counter-intuitive results.
–guy
If a person genuinely believes that the wrongness of those acts relies *solely* upon inference, you’ve got a lot more work to do, and you hardly have fellowship with them at all. The same inference that makes *any* teaching of Scripture relevant to the person in question, makes those teachings (if indeed they exist, which is obvious on the lying point but not so obvious on the polygamy one) relevant to that person. If they fail to infer that Scripture is relevant to their lives… you’ve got a bigger problem than what you’ve described above.
Nick,
A person could come to those conclusions without conceding to anything like a general belief that scripture isn’t relevant to their lives. Perhaps they believe monogamy is as cultural as polygamy, thus no scripture that has seems to endorse monogamy has cross-culture application. Perhaps they believe that examples of deception in Scripture are actually exemplary and in some technical sense do not contradict the idea of “bearing false witness.” There could be tailored reasons they endorse that are even compatible with CENI! But in such a case should we accept Campbell’s position that since such people do not apprehend the NI’s concerning lying or polygamy, then we can’t claim that our fellowship with them is broken or ought to be until they repent?
Plenty of people in the religious world today clearly do not apprehend any NI’s with respect to the practice of homosexuality. And notice, those people do not adhere to any sort of general principle that Scripture has no applicability to their lives. i suppose then because they have yet to see those NI’s for themselves, their impenitent homosexual acts or unions cannot be a basis for us to claim that our fellowship with them is or ought to be broken?
What if such people *never* come to see the NI’s regarding such subjects? According to Campbell, we have to extend our fellowship to them forever regardless of their sinful practices, no?
How does this not follow from Campbell’s position?
–guy
It does follow, and we are required to extend our fellowship to those who believe in Christ, but currently fail to apprehend all aspects of sin. The problem is not, “How does it not follow?” but how can we risk sawing off the only branch upon which others maintain fellowship with OUR error?
Nick,
i never made any claim about “failing to apprehend all aspects of sin.” i’m not even certain what that means. But i suspect it’s a red herring. Saying that a person is culpable (even to the affecting of fellowship) for *some* things they genuinely don’t recognize to be sinful does not entail that they are required to “apprehend all aspects of sin.”
i’m talking about a case C where:
(1) x is, in fact, sinful.
(2) The church recognizes that x is, in fact, sinful.
(3) Some individual S does not recognize that x is sinful.
(4) S commits x habitually.
(5) S desires fellowship with the church.
As i understand Campbell, the church in C is obligated to extend every fellowship to S both immediately and as long as (3) remains true. This suggests, i take it, Campbell sees S’s culpability for x or for x’s implications for fellowship between S and church not to be efficacious until such time as (3) is false.
There’s no way that’s true.
You said “we are required to extend fellowship to those who believe in Christ.” But even that doesn’t hold if Campbell’s position is true. Why? Because what it means to “believe in Christ” will be a matter of inference. If Campbell’s position is true, then we have no basis for disfellowshipping Gnostics, Docetics, Marcionites, etc. All such parties would claim to “believe in Christ,” but would not understand those words to include the NI’s on which the church has based the condemnation of their respective positions as heretical.
Paul said not to associate or eat with anyone who claims to be a brother but is sexually immoral (1Cor 5:11). John said don’t even welcome such people as Gnostics into your house unless you want to share in their heresy. (2John 9-11) i don’t see any way to harmonize these apostolic teachings with Campbell’s position. Campbell’s position leaves no consistent way to discern between truth or falsehood, orthodoxy or heresy, or who is or is not in fellowship.
–guy
Wait, i retract the very last sentence. You could maintain on Campbell’s position the ability to discern between truth/falsehood, orthodoxy/heresy. However, if Campbell’s position is true, there practical connection between such things and fellowship.
–guy
Whoops–“there’s no practical connection…”
guy, there’s a sense in which you might be correct. *If and only if* every doctrine of Christianity relies upon inference and deduction for its understanding, then Campbell’s position collapses, because then there are no such things as “commands and ordinances” such as he describes in Article 5 of the D&A.
If you are able to logically collapse everything into inference and deduction, then ipso facto Campbell must be saying that nothing can be held as terms of fellowship. Campbell would assert (in fact, does assert in the D&A) that there are facts and instructions in Holy Scripture that do not rely upon inference and deduction for their apprehension and acceptance. Therein lies your disagreement with him.
Whether or not “Jesus Christ came in the flesh” is not a matter that needs deduction or inference. It is a matter of fact. In 1 Cor 5, there is no disagreement – there is no need to infer or deduce that it is wrong to have your father’s wife. To pretend that there is is precisely the sophist “wisdom of the world” that Paul decries as foolishness.
Nick,
You wrote:
“Campbell would assert (in fact, does assert in the D&A) that there are facts and instructions in Holy Scripture that do not rely upon inference and deduction for their apprehension and acceptance. Therein lies your disagreement with him.”
i thought this is basically no different than the point you introduced yourself in your first comment:
“So, supposedly, it is necessary to infer something in order for me to appreciate them as authoritative for my own life.”
i recognize that Campbell likely had a narrower understanding of NI. But the difference between Campbell’s NI and the inference you introduced that any of the NT documents are applicable to me–i see how we might say that the two differ in degree, but not in kind. (What could be said? ‘Well, x is clearly commanded–no inference needed.’ Clear to whom? On what criteria of “clarity”? Is it clear to everyone in the Anglican or Episcopal or Lutheran churches that the Bible clearly teaches against homosexuality and this is not a matter of “inference” in the narrow Campbellian sense? No, it is exactly in that sense that parts of these groups would say other parts have made their conclusions about homosexuality, and they claim those inferences are mistaken rather than necessary.) And if that’s true, where to draw the line will be arbitrary, and the slippery slope ensues.
You wrote:
“Whether or not “Jesus Christ came in the flesh” is not a matter that needs deduction or inference. It is a matter of fact.”
What those words mean is a matter of deduction or inference. Perhaps a gnostic reads those words and says, “Sure He did–that is, the phenomenological experience of those people in Christ’s present was so real and apparent there was no prima facie way to discern between Him and any other material creature.” But that’s clearly not what you understand those words to mean, and certainly not what the church has historically understood them to mean. Further, these words are far less a problem for other heretical Christologies–adoptionism for instance.
Look, at the end of the day, i admit Campbell likely had a far more modest view in mind. But i’ve taken issue with the way it’s stated in the quote in the post; i don’t see what’s dialectically inappropriate about that. And even if the view had more nuance or qualification, i gather that underlying the view is still an endorsement of something like the primacy of the intellect/understanding.
–guy
guy –
But if you look, you’ll see that I introduced it because I used to think that inference was necessary in order to bridge the gap between original audience and me. I’m not sure I believe that anymore.
I belong to the body of Christ.
The Scriptures were given to the body of Christ.
Therefore, what is in Scripture was given to me.
As long as we are working within some sort of philosophically realistic framework, I believe that understanding eliminates the necessity of any inferences to deal with my problem. There is no gap to bridge – unless one stubbornly clings to the argument that all epistemology relies upon inference and deduction – that there is no real knowing at all apart from inference and deduction.
Whether that’s true or not is a matter for discussion, but demanding that the D&A be a treatise on epistemology is probably putting a little too much on old Thomas’ shoulders.
Remember that Thomas Campbell approached the New Testament as a constitution for God’s people (his words). He very much saw it as a legal document. That’s why his descriptions sound like a lawyer analyzing law code. I would differ from him in that basic understanding of the text.
Precisely right, Tim – the Campbells had no room for arguments that undermined the meaning of plain instructions. The American Constitutional difference between “freedom of religion” and the “separation of church and state” exemplifies this difference. One is a plainly enumerated right – the other is a hotly-debated inference.
IF Article 4 of the D&A is correct, THEN within that context, TC’s assertion about inferences makes powerful sense. IF he’s wrong about the constitutional nature of the Scriptures, THEN one must appreciate his humility about the binding of inferences, while being wary of cutting-and-pasting the idea directly into one’s framework of interpretation.
And I agree – while the Scriptures are an authoritative library of documents, they do not exert that authority in the same way that constitutions, roadmaps, or instruction manuals do.
Nick,
You wrote:
“I belong to the body of Christ.
The Scriptures were given to the body of Christ.
Therefore, what is in Scripture was given to me.”
i take the above to be the drawing of an inference in the clearest sense. If “inference” is being used in a way that would exclude what you’ve just done here, then i really don’t know what we’re talking about. And i don’t aim to be “stubborn” about this. i honestly don’t see what else “inference” could mean or how it could exclude the above in any principled way.
–guy
Just because something can be described by inference, doesn’t mean that inference is necessary to understand it.
Sure, I can create a logical construct to describe birds, but that doesn’t mean I have to infer that that thing in the sky is one.
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Nick,
i definitely agree that not all knowledge is inferential. But in the particular cases we’re talking about, i don’t see how it’s not. i don’t think reading and understanding a document is relevantly similar to visual experience of a bird in the sky.
But that’s neither here nor there. i take it the point is you’re saying that Campbell would hold that some of the things i’ve introduced are not based on NI’s, but based upon some non-inferential source–namely, commands or examples, yeah?
i still see the homosexuality case as a clear counter-example for what he says. While i may think that my beliefs about homosexuality are based on something clearer than NI’s, all the rebuttals provided by those religious people who disagree with my interpretations of those passages bear out that in every case i’m making an NI to get to my understanding of those passages. But i believe such cases lead to disobeying Paul at the very least. And i believe that the Lutheran and Anglican churches were not obligated to sit by and continue extending fellowship to people and even to newly ordained clergy that were, in fact, sexually immoral.
–guy
Are you saying, then, that in essence, all Christian knowing is inferential, even from a “constitutional documents” perspective?
I almost certainly agree with you on the Lutheran/Anglican question, where clergy is involved anyway. I’m not as convinced that we can make a blanket “homosexuals need not apply for fellowship, period” statement, though. 1 Cor 5 deals with high-handed and prideful sexual immorality – doing what you know is wrong because you don’t believe those little rules apply to you anymore. And 2 John deals with *teachers,* not all brethren.
Nick,
If i approach the NT as constitutional documents? Then, yes, i think all resulting knowledge would be inferential. But that’s part of my beef with the view frankly. i believe narratives in the nature of the case should afford non-inferential knowledge. (More specifically, second personal knowledge; Eleanore Stump has some fantastic new work about this related to the problem of evil in her new book Wandering in Darkness. If she’s right, she definitely undermines the still-prevalent Enlightenment view of epistemology and resulting anthropology. But her goals are far more modest; she just aims to defend the use of a tool for her treatment of certain biblical narratives in formulating her overall theodicy.)
But again, i’m using “inference” in the sense which i take to be clear. i’m still trying to get at what is meant by “NI” in this discussion or by Campbell. The best i have so far is something like, conclusions we draw in the absence of what is taken to be a clear command or example.
i agree about the 2John case. But teachers are brethren too even if not all brethren are teachers (Well, perhaps the teachers John was talking about may not be brethren). In the 1Cor 5 case, i don’t see why the individual being fully aware that they are acting in rebellion should be required. –Notice, i only picked on “sexually immoral,” but Paul gives a longer list there. Is it inconceivable that such people Paul is warning against couldn’t have some of the very same well-thought-out interpretations and rebuttals of traditional interpretations used to condemn their actions? i suppose we could make the argument that all such people are self-deceived, in which case, you’re right, on some level they would know that they are acting sinfully. But i tend to think it’s possible even if unlikely that some of them are genuine in their beliefs. (But i readily admit i could be underestimating the effects of the Fall here and perhaps we’re all self-deceived from it. Not sure there.) And if so, i don’t see why that genuineness would get someone off the hook for their behavior within the Christian community–that is, i’m not sure why we have to wait for that person to become proudly defiant in order to do what Paul said there. –especially since it may at that point simply become a tiff about what counts as “proud defiance.” Ugh.
–guy
The alternative to wrestling with what constitutes proud defiance rather than honest error is withdrawing fellowship from everyone (if honest error = sin, and sin must be withdrawn from in all cases) – that can’t be Paul’s meaning here because he spends the entire letter pleading for the opposite, and out of this entire divisive, mixed-up trainwreck of a congregation, he commands fellowship to be temporarily withdrawn from one person.
Withdrawing from anyone who disagrees with us about what constitutes sin is what has gotten the CoC where it is.
Nick,
i don’t accept that all honest error is equal or equally constitutes sin, nor do i think all sin is equal. (That is a latent notion that i believe has gotten the CoC where it is.)
–guy
Then, while you’re doing a bang-up job of deconstructing all my ideas, you’re not offering anything to help me work through those inequalities. :)
Well, i’m not about to say it solves everything, but this is why i more or less gave up hope on all that working out and opted for group with a clearer ecclesiastical authority structure. It comes with it’s own set of problems and dangers, but for time being, i’m more conscientiously comfortable with it than with what i came from–that is, i don’t have the same “splinter in my mind” experience i used to have. i may be wrong, but i don’t see how i could do any better.
–guy
How does Jesus’ radically open table fellowship with sinners who belonged to his covenant community influence how we address the question?
Nick,
i’m sad to say, contrary to the impression i get from what you point out about Jesus’ behavior, i’ve yet to belong to a church that clearly, explicitly, and self-consciously conceived of itself as a hospital for sinners.
–guy
Guy –
Reading your description of how you’ve handled the splinter in your mind, I think you’ll appreciate Patrick’s recent blog about the same idea.
http://tentpegs.patrickmead.net/?p=1664