The Triumph of God's Law

Militant, triumphant. These are the two words that come to my mind in describing Gary North's "Prologue" in Dr. Greg Bahnsen's book, "By This Standard: The Authority of God's Law Today." The Prologue is long, but interesting, informative, and very encouraging. After reading it, I spend some time contemplating for a suitable title. "The Triumph of God's Law" captures the ideas shared in those 16 pages. 

Gary North unfolds his theme by mentioning the timely appearance of the book, a unique idea of international evangelism, information about Dr. Greg Bahnsen, other books on biblical law, critics, humanism, and the future of biblical law. 

The Timely Appearance of the Book

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Before elaborating about the timely appearance of the book, North describes Dr. Bahnsen's piece as " a kind lawyer's brief," "tightly reasoned, yet clear." In the book you can find "the basic outline of the New Testament's case for the continuing validity of Old Testament law" (p. xi). And "Argument by argument, Dr. Bahnsen refutes the supposed biblical arguments against the continuing validity of the law of God" (ibid.). And then he pointed out the timely appearance of the book due to an intellectual shift that was happening among "a minority of American church leaders" (ibid.). And among many reasons for this mental shift, North singled out the 1973 decision of the US Supreme Court regarding the removal of the state laws against abortion. This decision exposed the real color of the myth of neutrality; it doesn't exist. North gave casuistry as a concrete example of this and was happy to announce that such exposure was spreading to other fields that include critical issues like "pornography, inflation, officially neutral tax-supported education ('values clarification'), homosexuality, globalism, the New World Order, New Age humanism, and contemporary Western theories of national defense (mutually assured destruction, or MAD)" (p. xiii). 

And then before proceeding to introduce Dr. Greg Bahnsen, Dr. North identified a unique idea about international evangelism through biblical law. He based this assertion from Deuteronomy 4:5-8, and then closed this section by asking the question, "By what standard?", which answer is the very reason for the existence of the book. 

Introducing Dr. Greg Bahnsen

Gary North has a high regard for Dr. Bahnsen. They both shared similar intellectual background through the influence of Dr. Cornelius Van Til. And then he describes Bahnsen's writing style and shared a couple of sarcastic stories. As logically rigid and precise writer, Bahnsen's style requires focused attention from his readers for them to understand what he's saying. With a mixture of appreciation for Dr. Bahnsen and sarcasm for his critics, Dr. North characterizes the strategy of the former as follows: 

"He considers the standard arguments that have been used against the idea of the continuing validity of biblical law, and he exposes them, one by one, as illogical, anti-biblical, and productive of great harm. He shows not only that these arguments are wrong logically but also that they are wrong morally. He wraps his opponents in an exegetical net. The more they struggle, the more ensnared they become. He never names them, but you can hear them screaming anyway" (pp. xvi-xvii).

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North is an interesting storyteller. I like the way he compared Dr. Bahnsen's performance in the book to "milking" a poisonous snake:

"His performance could also be compared to a man who 'milks' a poisonous snake: he operates methodically, without visible emotion, and precisely. Eventually, the snake is rendered harmless. Temporarily. Until the poison is again manufactured by its system. Then it's another round of 'milking,' with yet another argument being squeezed dry of logical and biblical content, until the snake is exhausted. On and on it goes, until the snake finally dies or has its fangs extracted. To appreciate the technician's efforts, however, the observer must recognize the danger of the poison and the, seriousness of the operation. The observer also should not be surprised that from start to finish, there is a lot of outraged hissing going on" (p. xvii). 

Again, pertaining to Dr. Bahnsen's critics, North reserved another "interesting" story. This time, its about the debate with Dr. Meredith Kline. After indicating that published criticism of Dr. Bahnsen's ideas on biblical law is almost non-existent, Dr. North narrates the outcome of intellectual exchanges between Dr. Kline and Dr. Bahnsen: 

"A few critical essays appeared, but only one was of any academic significance, Dr. Meredith Kline's, and Dr. Bahnsen's subsequent response ended the debate. Whenever I reread the two essays, I am reminded of that 5-second 'underground' cartoon, 'Bambi Meets Godzilla.' Bambi is skipping through the forest, when a giant reptilian foot squashes him. End of cartoon. In the case of Dr. Kline, end of debate. There was no rematch. (The most amusing aspect of this historic confrontation is that 'Bambi' initiated it.)" (p. xvii-xviii).

The Heart of the Prologue

At this point, Dr. North touches the heart of his Prologue: the conflict between biblical law and humanism. Other books on biblical law are acknowledged: Bahnsen's "Theonomy in Christian Ethics," Rushdoony's "Institutes of Biblical Law," Jordan's "Law of the Covenant," and North's economic commentaries. One must consider that Dr. Bahnsen's present book is simply an introduction to biblical law. 

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Dr. Bahnsen's critics are losing the intellectual battle not only against the advocates of biblical law, but also against the humanists. Dr. North, through another humorous-sarcastic biblical analogy, rebuked and challenged Christians to recover biblical law in confronting humanism:

"Unlike the comic book advertisement for Charles Atlas's 'dynamic tension' program, where the 200-pound bully kicks sand in the face of the 98-pound weakling, Christians in the twentieth century have been the 200-pound weaklings who have been pushed around by 98-pound bullies. Like Samson without his hair, Christians without God's law are impotent, and have been regarded by Philistines throughout the ages as drudges to be misused and humiliated publicly, if the opportunity presents itself. What Dr. Bahnsen is proposing is that we flex our muscles and knock the pillars out from under humanism's temple. But this time, we should push from the outside of the arena, not pull from the inside. When it comes to social collapse, let the Philistines of our day be inside. Let us pick up the pieces" (p. xix).

North then turns to humanism. He accurately diagnosed it as hiding behind a popular slogan, collapsing, and accusing Christianity of tyranny. The slogan "we're under grace not law" obscures the real situation that in fact the threat to society today is not the law of God, but the rule of humanistic laws. Our proper response therefore is to "start studying, preaching, and rallying behind biblical law" (p. xix). By doing this, Christians can "come up with valid social alternatives to a collapsing humanist civilization" (p. xx). 

However, humanists will not easily give up. Their accusation of tyranny due to the idea of applying Christianity to politics is successful. Christians feel guilty and suffer inferiority. For North, this accusation has no credibility for the accusers are guilty of far more and bigger crimes. How can the humanists say that the crimes committed by Christians such as the medieval crusades prove the unworkability of Christianity in politics whereas they themselves have launched wars and revolutions killing as many as 150 million in the first 70 years of 20th century alone? North wrote two more paragraphs to prove that humanists have no right to accuse Christians of crimes. 

"These same critics have complained repeatedly about the Roman Catholic Church's burning of the occult magician Bruno or Calvin's approval of the burning of unitarian Servetus (with the enthusiastic approval of the Catholics, who were also after him, and who tipped Calvin off when Servetus came into Geneva), four centuries ago. Compare these two events with the atrocities of Stalin, who killed 20 to 30 million Russians in his purges in the 1930's, including a million Communist Party members, plus an additional ten million who died unnatural deaths during the famines produced by his forced collectivization of agriculture. Then there is the continuing atrocity of the Soviet Union's concentration camp population, which has probably included about one third of the Soviet population over the years, with at least one percent of the entire population in the camps at any given time" (pp. xxii-xxiii).

"This slaughter took place in the 1930's without any significant criticism in the prestigious liberal humanist press for the next twenty years. Malcolm Muggeridge, a reporter for the Manchester Guardian in this era, says in the first volume of his autobiography that Western reporters and liberals knew what Stalin was doing; they approved of his ruthlessness. Even in our day, some apologists still exist. ("Stalin, despite certain excesses, was a progressive force in his day, and we must understand that it is not easy to bring a backward society into technological maturity, blah, blah, blah.") Yet these same ideologues taunt Christians about the Salem witch trials in the 1690's, in which all of 20 people were executed, and which never happened again. In one year, Mao's policies killed 30 million Chinese. Spare Christians the guilt trips, please." (p. xxiii).

The accusation therefore of humanists lack credibility. Accusing Christianity of tyranny is hypocritical for this is the very crime that our humanistic generation is most guilty of. The fear of many who believe humanism that biblical law leads to tyranny is baseless. Tyranny actually happens when people refuse the law of God. North explains:

". . . Wouldn't biblical law lead to tyranny? I answer: Why should it? God designed it. God mandated it. Was Israel a tyranny? Or was Egypt the real tyranny, and Babylon? Tyranny was what God visited upon His people when they turned their backs on biblical law" (p.xxiv).

So Christians should better prepare with biblical alternatives upon the collapse of humanistic society. North describes such preparation:

"When that day comes, Christians had better be ready with the biblical answer: voluntary charity, the tithe to finance the church, and all levels of civil government combined limited by Constitutional law to under ten percent of the people's income. The state is not God, and is therefore not entitled to a tithe. . . Humanists can only cough up enough money to pay pipers when they have stolen the money with the ballot box, by means of the politics of guilt and pity, and the politics of envy. The gospel of Christ, when accompanied by faith in biblical law, destroys the psychological foundations of political guilt, pity, and envy. The humanists' political end is in sight, and they are outraged. Psalm 2 tells us what God thinks of their outrage, and how much good it does them." (p. xxv). 

Challenge and Declaration of Confidence

North ends his Prologue with a challenge to critics and a declaration of confidence about the future of biblical law: 

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"I will put it bluntly: no theologian of repute (or even disrepute) has successfully challenged Dr. Bahnsen's defense of biblical law during the last eight years. I will go farther: no theologian or Christian social thinker in our generation is capable of successfully challenging Dr. Bahnsen's general thesis, because it is correct. I will take it one step farther: we will not see any prominent Christian philosopher even attempt it, because enough of them know what happened to Meredith Kline: he was cut off at the knees in full view of anyone who bothered to read Dr. Bahnsen's response. Nobody is excited about the prospects of going up against Dr. Bahnsen in print. It leads to excessive humiliation" (p. xxv).

"Yet if someone from at least one modern theological camp does not respond, and respond soon - dispensationalist, neo-evangelical, Reformed, Roman Catholic, or Eastern Orthodox - then the intellectual battle is very nearly won by the theonomists. It does no good for defenders of an older world-and-life view to pretend that they can safely ignore a brilliant case presented for any new position, let alone the biblical position. If the establishment theologians remain silent for another eight years, the theonomists will have captured the minds of the next generation of Christian activists and social thinkers. Once the younger activists and intellectuals are won over, the fight is in principle over. To the victors will go the spoils: the teaching positions, the satellite T. V. networks, and shelf space in the Christian bookstores and maybe even secular bookstores, until they finally go bankrupt or go Christian." (p. xxvi).

"Now who will be the sacrificial lamb? Who wants to attempt to prove in print that this little book is the work of a heretic, or an incompetent? Who will be the person to try to prove that this book's thesis cannot be sustained by an appeal to the New Testament? Who will then go on to refute Theonomy in Christian Ethics? A lot of very bright young men are waiting to hear from you, and then to hear from Dr. Bahnsen. Stay tuned for "Bambi Meets Godzilla, Part II" (p. xxvi).

Source: Bahnsen, G. L. (1985). By This Standard: The Authority of God's Law Today. Tyler, Texas: Institute for Christian Economics.