The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Michael McClymond on Universalism

Evangelical Universalism Arguments against Evangelical Universalism
#241

Hi James :smiley:

For all of you conspiracy theorists out there – he does make the point that saving knowledge became a priority in Lutheranism and Calvinism and that some historians have pointed out who Calvinism caught on like wildfire in all of the areas in which the Cathar heresy had flourished (as if it fed into a pre-existing narrative). Btu in the end he affirms that other factors in reformation Lutheranism and Calvinism kept these two Churches just about in balance. However, he argues that the balance became distorted in American Calvinism, particularly by Edwards.

For example the whole addictive nature of revivalism in which people seek an inner/individualistic experience of their election is construed as somewhat Gnostic and anti ecclesial (as is the ideal of a Church purified of sinners and only for perfect people of moral perfection and perfected belief).

He also talks about Edwards emphasis on individuals being ‘brides of Christ’ rather than the Church as a community being the Bride. This led Edwards to break down any sense of human solidarity. For example when there was an epidemic in his parish that killed many young children he castigated parents for grieving telling them they should not have dotted on their children but rather should have saved their affections for God. And he gives other examples of the same advice being given regarding the relationship between husbands and wives and a statement by Edwards wife in which she gave witness to having completely transcended physical existence and holding this out as a desirable goal.

There’s lots of stuff in there – but another thing that stood out was that Billy Graham gave support and endorsement to Norman Vincent Peal’s ‘The Power of Positive Thinking’. The thing I take from this and many other examples is not the Americans who believe in hell are Gnostic while Evangelical Universalists are not prone to Gnosticism (although their universalism is not in itself Gnostic). Rather it is that we should all be aware of Gnostic influences – including Dr McClymond and co. who see themselves as beyond contamination it would seem.

#242

A summary of my view of Dr McClymond -

He’s on extremely weak ground saying that universalism has its roots in ancient Gnosticism

He’s on extremely weak ground again when saying that universalism first appeared again in cohesive form with the writings of Jacob Boehme and that Origen was a marginal figure until revival of interest in him in the twentieth century. It is fair to say that a modified Boehmenism (that is Boehmenism dualism modified by other currents such as the Origenistic one) became one of several currents in modern universalism – but that is as far as we can go.

He’s on weak ground when talking about eternal hell in a cultural/historical context’ (like it was acceptable to huge monolithic swathes of humanity within certain cultures in the past, and is so in Islam today)

He’s on stronger ground in drawing attention to the importance of Hegel in modern thought – (but the influence of Boehme on Hegel is controversial – and Hegel and Schelling took Boehme’s thinking in a historicist pantheistic direction that was no longer specifically Christian but also not specifically Gnostic in the ancient sense) and can be seen in twentieth century teachings of the Process School and in Paul Tillich for example (but these schools of theology are not Christian universalist).

He’s on stronger ground when alluding to the influence of currents of hermeticism and Boehmenism on American culture via transcendentalism (but currents of individualism and platonic - rather than hermetic - dualism can also clearly be seen as arising from within Evangelicalism so the picture is far too complex to begin a witch hunt - we should look to ourselves).

(Regarding the modified Boehmenist currents in universalism – I’d be loath to heresy hunt all figures in the history of Christian Universalism that were somehow associated with it on Dr McClymond’s advice (especially George MacDonald). It’s influence today is very marginal indeed and I think a bit of historical imagination is required to understand its influence in the past).

He’s on very shaky ground citing Bonheoffer, Kierkegaard and Neibuhr.

I think some work some proper needs to be done in Universalist history since this is what is under attack. Something is probably required beyond discussion threads to put this one in proper scholarly perspective. :slight_smile:

#243

Reinhold Niebuhr, in The Kingdom of God in America criticized the Christian liberal gospel, describing its message as, “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross.” (1938 p.193) It is a ringing phrase often used in ECT polemics and employed by Dr McClymond in his lecture. However – although Niebuhr clearly believed in God’s wrathful judgement he was also a hopeful, edging towards certain, Universalist.

A young Niebuhr, similar to Barth, stopped short of declaring with certainty that everyone will be saved. Concerning the freedom of divine sovereignty he stated that one must leave humanity’s fate in the hands of God. However, later he recognised that ‘the centre and heart of all things, the first and the last Being, is utter goodness, complete love.’’ Although God’s justice condemns sin and demands repentance, his goodness will ultimately save everyone. (*The Responsibility of the Church for Society and Other Essays *1945 pp 127-8)

‘’It is foolish for Christians to claim any knowledge of either the furniture of heaven or the temperature of hell…Literalistic conceptions of the allegedly everlasting fires of hell have frequently discredited the idea of a final judgment…It is prudent to accept the testimony of the heart, which affirms the fear of judgment." (*The Nature and Destiny of Man, Vol. II Human Destiny *1943, p. 294.)

‘‘Every person, so far as he is a self, participates in the life of faith and is a subject of redemption, thus belonging to the Catholic church more or less actively. Ever person, so far as he participates in the anxiety, distrust and disloyalty of the world – that is to say every person. Outside the community of faith. The line between church and world runs through every soul not between souls’’ (*Faith on Earth: An Inquiry into the Structure of Human Faith *1952, p. 116-17)

‘’Rather than think of hell as a place of everlasting punishment, we might speak of a present social hell, a hellish existence marked by anarchy and destruction as various social groups battle others who threaten their survival’’. (The Anachronism of Jonathan Edwards, unpublished paper pp.130 131)

#244

One person who is mentioned as a Universalist in the lecture for whom the evidence is flimsy is the French Jesuit Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Teilhard attempted a synthesis Christian theology with the theory of evolution and modern cosmology. He posited that Christ is the Omega point towards which all creation is converging. HE was enormously popular in the 1950s and 1960s and a bette noir of both fundamentalists and conservative Catholics. He is no longer popular because most people see his writing as a failure in terms of his grasp of science. He used Nyssa along with Augustine and Ambrose (for a non literal view of Genesis) in his attempted synthesis. However, despite the influence of Nyssa he was not a Universalist. See -

ts.mu.edu/readers/content/pd … 27.4.2.pdf

TEILHARD’S THEOLOGY OF REDEMPTION

There is one quotation from his Le Mileu Divin that suggests universalism (and it is the quotation that I’ve seen bandied about on the net as words of comfort) -

However given the extensive evidence of his belief in hell given in the paper linked above (across many written works published and unpublished throughout his life) this seems to be an exhortation not to despair of any person while alive rather than a commitment to universalism. It is nowhere near as strong as saying that hell exists but it may be empty (and it is an isolated statement). Put it this way - it’s the weakest form of universal hope that I’ve seen this far; but in fairness to Dr McClymond Le Mileu is a late work and he writings in which he speaks about hell are earlier so he may have edged towards a weak from of hopeful universalism before his death.

Final note - there is a book

J. A. Lyons, The Cosmic Christ in Origen and Teilhard de Chardin: A Comparative Study (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982)

but this is a comparison rather than a tracing of influences. I have not found any evidence to suggest that Tielhard was influenced by Origen - but I will keep an open mind. :slight_smile:

#245

The only stuff I’ve been able to find that fits Dr McClymond’s view well is this written by Schelling -

‘To the Son, then, is Being away from God, alienated from God and the Father, given over, that he may reconcile it again to the Father. He has received Being as away from and unacceptable to the Father, that he may give it back to him again, as Godlike, again acceptable and reconciled to him. This will be completely realized only at the end of the World-time. Then shall Being which was away from God and wholly alienated from him be in the Father’ (Sämmtliche Werke IV, p. 62, 1856).

So his beef is with German idealism.

#246

Yes, good catch Dick!

#247

Mr Teilhard is addressing something i have had trouble with. Even outside Universalism, Evolution has a troubling aspect in that it is wasteful. It seems cold and harsh even for nature, but to attribute its purely blind movement with God who is Love is a stretch even if you believe in ECT (or perhaps more so). And in this current world i can understand the idea of [metaphorical] darkness as a corollary to to [metaphorical] light, though it’s never as simple as that.
However, i find that his view of there being an antipodes to God (even though sort of logically consistent) sounds a little like dualism, possibly edging onto the idea of Zoroastrianism (albeit not two warring spirits but one that has two poles…a bipolar God if you will), and that to me contradicts the Biblical concept of God being all in all. I expect he’d argue against that, but as the ECT/Anni arguments against “all in all” REALLY meaning “all” are incredibly weak, i doubt he’d do better.
Still, this is an intriguing view that attempts to do justice to patterns in nature, and i respect that. However, i believe that God is God of the broken and the castaway, and that even an evolutionary reject would find rescue, solace and even repair in God. He is certainly capable of fixing disabilities, so why not other genetic issues?
I realise i’m extrapolating and that this is hard to reach from a plain reading, but it’s a hard concept, and i don’t think i’m doing violence to the text here, or requiring that God have an “opposite” of any kind (even satan would love to be an opposite, but he’s too weak).

#248

That’s interesting James - I don’t know a great deal about Teilhard apart from that -

He was really popular with ‘progressive’ Christians but his popularity has declined

He was seen as a vile blot by high Calvinists like Francis Schaeffer and by conservative Catholics

He got into trouble with the Jesuit order for down playing the Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin

Some Teilhard fans today say that if you take his work as poetic theology rather than scientific theology it works better

He was fooled by the Piltdown Man (missing link) fraud - which didn’t do his scientific reputation a lot of good

I’d agree that equating eschatology with evolutionary processes and the damned with evolutionary waste, at least on the surface, has very problematic implications indeed!!!

I guess my main point here (in the context of Dr McClymond’s lecture) is that whether or not we can give credence to a single ambiguous sound bite as evidence of Teilhard edging towards hopeful universalism in later life the body of his work, when he was developing his theories, shows that he was not a universalist at all. In contrast Reinhold Niebuhr said a couple of things that seemed to suggest he was not a universalist but taken in the context of his whole opus make perfect sense as part of hopeful universalism that is edging towards certain universalism.

#249

This is the first i’d heard of Teilhard personally, but it does sound like he was at least attempting to reconcile faith with evolutionary processes. It’s a shame he got the Piltdown Man wrong, but initially so did everybody, so it’s a shame he’s slated for that (unless he was REALLY late to the party :wink: )

I actually hadn’t gone as far as thinking of the implications, but now i do, yes…they are worrying. To envisage the idea that we evolve into Grace and thus anyone who fails to evolve is damned…that sounds pretty evil, and definitely not in keeping with God even from an ECT/Anni perspective.

It is bizarre of McClymond to quote hopeful Universalists against Universalists, and attribute Universalism to those that affirmed some form of eternal separation…

And the fact you’re able to demonstrate their positions with quotes and references really puts his research into doubt.

#250

I think some argue that he actually helped perpetrate the fraud - or at the very least connived at the fraud once he knew it was fraud - because evidence of a clear linear direction in the evolution of humanity fitted well into his thinking about purpose (as opposed to randomness) in evolution. :slight_smile:

#251

Ah, i see…thanks for clearing that up! That’s pretty silly, then.
That’s as bad as McClymond’s crap scholarship here, then! If it doesn’t fit…misquote and get things blatantly wrong until it does! :laughing:

#252

I understand the talk of evolution might be highly controversial here, I don’t wish to cause strife so take what follows if it interests or helps you, but if not leave this paragraph alone.

Well work in genome research along with better understandings of more complex mechanisms that might be involved in change, as well as advances in the understanding of “search algorithms” at work in a rough landscape suggest evolution would not be random in a broader sense. That the scientific use of the term randomness is not to also suggest that the process is open-ended and purposeless, rather the evolutionary process is an efficient search algorithm optimizing for specific functions. In fact, the increasing view is that it follows well defined paths which are constrained by the nature of chemistry and physics, in which there are only a number of limited possible solutions, with stable points in the biological space. Therefore it is not a sequences of accidents, but of God calling life to be what it is, and granting it the freedom in that creative process to find it’s way to becoming what He was calling it to be (along the lines of Genesis ‘let the land produce living creatures’ etc, creation is given freedom to be itself and find it’s way to what God is calling and working with it to be), God is more like a caring gardener rather then an engineer in this picture (though those pictures are not mutually exclusive of course).

More on the subject of the Piltdown Man, the drive behind the hoax was not just to create confirmation for at least a progressive Darwinism, but also to prevent the idea that humanity might have emerged and developed in Africa, there was heavy bias against this idea for a number of cultural reasons, and as a result, the Taung skull found by Raymond Dart was both largely ignored and he suffered major and in many areas (though not all) unjustified criticisms. It took a long time with numerous other finds before the scientific community was finally willing to move away from Europe or Asia as the possible birthplace of humanity, so the drive in both creating and accepting the Piltdown hoax for as long as they did had as much to do with colonial and post-colonial negative attitudes to Africa as other concerns.

#253

That’s very interesting :smiley:

#254

A quick note here - I’ve discussed something I’ve found out about John Pordage on another thread; but I thought I ought to plonk it here also. John Pordage is given scoffing treatment as a universalist in the lecture. I already knew he was not a universalist from an authoritative secondary source but I’ve actually found a primary source which shows he was not a universalist; he had a view of hell being self chosen that echoes C.S. Lewis in some ways -

#255

I’m still reading around this subject and have found out a lot more – but I don’t really want to post too much of it on site. However, I will give a few tidbits –

I was wrong about Erskine of Linlathen – I should l have seen from the ‘All Shall Be Well’ anthology that he too was strongly influenced by William Law like GMac. However, neither can have been edged towards universalism by Boehme because Boehme wasn’t a universalist. Boehme’s influence on Western Culture seems to have been like a counterpoint to Baconian rationalism (and Aristotle , Bacon and Reid have strongly influenced Reformed theology). Boehme’s influence has been an important undercurrent with people thinking about poetics, the place of the imagination in our comprehension of truth etc. So when we say that someone was ‘influenced’ by Boeheme we need to think of specifics rather than talking about universalism (for example Paul Tillich was influenced by Boheme in his thinking about being and becoming not in his rather abstract speculation about universal salvation and essentialism).

Gerard Winstanley – the first person to promote universalism in a ‘sect’ named the Diggers (along with promoting other things like digging the land) was in no way influenced by Boehme – he doesn’t share any poetic images or linguistic turns of phrase with Boehme and the Boehmenists, However, the Muggletonians a very exclusive sect from the same time– do show the clear influence of Boehme
William Law makes use of Boehme mainly as a way of responding to Deism – but his thinking about atonement and incarnation is drawn mainly from Irenaeus and the Church Fathers.

Hegel was not a Universalist – nowhere in his system does he express any clear belief in the immorality of the soul!!! Rather he uses theological terms to talk about the trajectory of human history and the development of human consciousness away from the ‘unhappy/divided consciousness’ towards freedom and philosophical ‘cheerfulness’. He does use (reinterpret/misuse?) some of Boehme’s thinking to express his ideas – but there is a big debate about whether Hegel was actually inspired by Boehme or simply read his ideas back into Boehme for confirmation. But Hegel was not a Christian Universalist and his philosophical ideas have been a currency used by fairly conservative traditional Christians, pantheists or atheist materialists depending on how you interpret him.

Dr McClymond mentions the Apocryphon of John as a key Gnostic universalist text. As Jason has said the text has nothing t do with Universal salvation. What it does relate is the fall of the virgin Sophia as she created a being independently from the high god, This being becomes the demiurge who creates the world as a prison for sparks of spirit. So he’s confusing Christian Sophiology with universalism. Christian Sophiology – whatever you think of it – is not the same as the Gnostic speculations because in Christina Sophiology the virgin Sophia is not a fallen being but an agent of redemption. Neither is Sophiology connected necessarily to universalism – Anselm and most importantly Dante were heavily influenced by the figure of Sophia (obviously in the case of Dante!!!). And the only connection of Sophia with universalism is through the later Boehmenists – who represent one tradition in universalism - revered Sophia and were also believers in apocatastasis (the earlier Boehmneists who revered Sophia believed in a dual outcome after judgment by way of contrast). Soloviev’s first vision of Sophia was at nine years old – he must have been reading Dante because this si the same age at which Beatrice first appears to Dante in a dream in La Vita Nuova.

The debate over missions and eschatology is not new. There was a big influence of coniditonalsim (rather than universalism) on the British missionary movement in the nineteenth century when it was at its height (many missionaries were traumatised by the idea that the real people they were coming into contact with might be destined for eternal conscious torment). The same debate happened at a lower key in America.

#256

Thanks Dick, nice to get even more clarification.

I guess many have been “influenced” by Boehme, but we can’t just assume belief in universalism came through him.
Is it possible that he was a “stepping stone” for some, though? As for example Christadelphian Annihilationism was for me?

NightRevan, nice post on evolution and the Piltdown man! Really interesting!

#257

I guess he was a steeping stone like C.S. Lewis is in that hell is self chosen in Boehme’s system as in Lewis’s thinking and both insights have been a stepping stone. But before Jane Lead Boehmenists were not Universalists, her reception by German and Dutch Boehemenists was largely hostile whene she taught apocatastasis. Also the European Philadelphians whom Jane Lead inspired were not Boehmenists (and to complicate matters even more, not all of the English Philadelphians were Universalists). Ach my poor head – and this is too messy to be the inspiration for a conspiracy theory ( but that’s the thing about conspiracy theories – they need to be challenged properly or people believe them and i fear some proper work will be needed to challenge this one).
I think William Law is important in the history of universalism – because of his influence on Louis Claude St Martin in the Boehmenist tradition and his influence on these outside of Boehmenism such as George Mac, Erskine and the Broadlands Conferences crowd, and F.D. Maurice and latter Charles – ‘Charlie boy’ – Williams of the Inklings (and on people like Coleridge who influenced C.S. Lewis and George Mac regarding romantic imagination and was never a decided universalist and was influenced by Boehme regarding poetics and imagination and a view of nature as God bearing. William Law certainly has brought people to universalism. Yes a lot could be said about exactly how he uses Boheme and how his thoughts on apocatastasis and non-violent atonement acutally come from quite different sources (there are elements of penal substitution atonement in Boehme). Also his relationship with John Wesley is very interesting; Wesley attacked him in a book once he became influenced by Boehme and took apart his arguments for universal salvation, for non subsitutionary atonement, and against Methodist ‘enthusiasm’ syllogistically (and often very sarcastically). There is more to this conflict than meets the eye and I think it amusing that the first time that Wesley fell out with his old friend and much loved mentor William Law was over justification by faith. Wesley complained to Law that Law had never taught this, while a certain Peter Bohler had taught this and given Wesley his heart-warming experience of conversion – och and it turns out that Peter Bohler was a Moravian universalist. But apart from scoring some cheap points regarding Bohler – Law is a key figure who needs a judicious assessment.

It’s good that Dr McClymond has raised these issues. But has own research has obviously been merely by google links according to an agenda. IN his lecture he refers to a critic of Boehme who likened his work to a picnic. This critic was Northrop Frye who was lauding William Blake - of all people – in the same book. Frye later changed his mind about Boehme according him ‘profound and difficult thinker’ status.

#258

Another point of interest which I can now clarify more exactly regards Dr McClymond’s contention about Purgatory in Catholicism and a shifting of emphasis about the doctrine of Purgatory being a part of post modern ‘fluidity’.

During that in the high middle ages and in the counter reformation it is true that purgatory was seen by many Catholics as being exactly like hell only not permanent. It was a place of ferocious and ingenious punishments by torture in which those he died in the faith but were not fully repentant suffered the wrath of God for any thoughts, deeds and words not covered for them by Christ’s subsitutionary atonement. Of course this idea of Purgatory lead to a system of Church enrichment through the sale of pardons and chantries for souls of the dead paid for by the bequests of rich patrons as an attempt to bribe God to lessen punishment. However the decline of this view of purgatory and replacement of it with an idea that conforms more to the teaching of the Church Fathers that the purgatorial fire is not God’s vindictive wrath but rather an ameliorative fire to free the sinner of sin – is not a post modern thing. It began with the teachings of St Catherine of Genoa 1447 – 1510. In 1908 Baron Friedrich von Hügel in his study of Catherine entitled The Mystical Element of Religion (1908) charts the profound shift in Catholic teaching about Purgatory over a three hundred year period due to her writings.

#259

And if we going to get sentimental for the time when Catholics preached hell in its fullness (forgive the sarcasm here) let us ponder the popular Sheffield missionary Reverend Joseph Furness (not kidding it was his real name) whose ‘Books for Children’ were widely circulated among English Catholics in the nineteenth century. On the evening before his hellfire sermon to children at his mission school in Sheffield he would address them thus-

On the day of the illustrated sermon he would describe six dungeons to the children, each with its appropriate torture; a burning dress, a deep pit, a boiling kettle, a red hot oven, and a red hot coffin. IN the fifth dungeon a tormented child is seen –

Some things do change for the better -thanks be to God.

#260

Good grief, that’s hard to imagine.
However - about 20 years ago, in an evening service at an AoG church - a visiting group from another church took the service and did an extended skit - about 30 minutes - called ‘your descent into Hell’.
They had some elaborate and horrifying sets and costumes, and music, and as we sank into the pit, the leader of the group would shout out:
“As sure as you are settin’ in them there pews (those are the exact words btw), many of you who think you are saved will be making this last eternal trip.”

I started to laugh so Ronda made me leave. :smiley: