Category Archives: John R. Muether

Why Machen Hired Van Til (Hart & Muether)

Articles, D. G. Hart, General, John R. Muether

“Why Machen Hired Van Til” by D. G. Hart and John R. Muether

When J. Gresham Machen left Princeton in 1929 to start Westminster he insisted that Cornelius Van Til be the professor of apologetics at the new seminary. To students who would later study with Van Til Machen’s resolve was obvious; the Dutch Calvinist’s presuppositional apologetics was the backbone of a truly Reformed education. But to Machen’s former students and colleagues and Princeton his choice of Van Til was odd. Van Til’s apologetical method broke with Old Princeton’s evidentialism and appeared to undermine Machen’s claim that Westminster was perpetuating Princeton.

 

Orthodox Presbyterians have tried to fit together the pieces of the Machen-Van Til apologetics puzzle if only because of the importance of both men in shaping the identity of their denomination. For instance, the late Greg L. Bahnsen argued that Van Til’s presuppositionalism was fundamentally compatible with Machen’s reliance upon rational proofs and that the apparent tensions between Machen and Van Til stemmed from a misreading of both. In contrast, Charles G. Dennison has tried to show that Machen in his later years was learning from the new faculty at Westminster and so would have come around to Van Til’s position in due course.[2] Whatever the merits of these explanations, Machen’s choice of Van Til could not have been better given the context of the ecclesiastical and theological struggles of the 1920s and 1930s. That decision also continues to be instructive for Orthodox Presbyterians today who desire to preserve the unique and faithful witness of the church.

Cornelius Van Til: Reformed Apologist and Churchman (John R. Muether)

Books, General, John R. Muether

Cornelius Van Til: Reformed Apologist and Churchman by John R. Muether

Cornelius Van Til (1895–1987), who taught apologetics at Westminster Theological Seminary for more than forty years, has—through his teaching and writings—called two generations of thinkers to a Christian worldview and a biblical defense of the faith. Yet, twenty years after his death, conflicting claims about Van Til’s apologetic legacy abound. What most interpreters tend to overlook is his life as a Presbyterian churchman.

 

This biography locates Van Til in the context of twentieth-century Presbyterian and Reformed ecclesiastical struggles in America, including the formation of Westminster Seminary and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, the rise of neo-evangelicalism and American expressions of Barthianism, and post–World War II developments in the Christian Reformed Church. As Van Til spent his life “raising high the banner of the Reformed faith,” his role in these debates arose from his hopes for a church that was self-consciously rooted in its Reformed identity.

Van Til the Controversialist (John R. Muether)

Articles, General, John R. Muether

“Van Til the Controversialist” by John R. Muether

In 1976 Cornelius Van Til published an article entitled “Calvin the Controversialist” in a collection of essays in honor of John H. Gerstner, a former student of his. The article was a fitting tribute to Gerstner, himself no stranger to theological controversy and one with whom Van Til had crossed apologetic swords. Moreover, by writing about Calvin, Van Til wisely chose to appeal to his and Gerstner’s common theological forefather. In explaining Calvin’s life and work, Van Til noted that Calvin’s life of controversy began when he embraced Protestantism. As a Protestant, controversy was no option for Calvin. In outlining the contours of Calvin’s theology, Van Til underscored that throughout his work the Genevan reformer bore a practical and ecclesiastical burden. For Calvin, the Protestant Reformation was the recovery of the Christian story for the Christian community. …