{"id":1685,"date":"2026-05-03T18:43:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-03T17:43:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/?page_id=1685"},"modified":"2026-05-04T20:16:01","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T19:16:01","slug":"critiques","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/dominion-theology-recovering-our-social-and-political-responsibility\/critiques\/","title":{"rendered":"The Critiques of Dominion Theology"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

The Critiques of Dominion Theology<\/h2>\n

Overview<\/h3>\n

Dominion theology\u00a0was always controversial and Bahnsen\u00a0suffered a sustained attack over his Theonomy<\/em>\u00a0from its publication date in 1977; the dispute over the work eventually led to his \u201cdismissal\u201d from RTS.[1]<\/a> However, that was a dispute over Reformed\u00a0theology and localized in that movement. It was also a dispute regarding the praxis of a theological position regarding the status of the old covenant Mosaic law, a position that could legitimately claim to have formed a part of the Westminster Confession. What was \u201cnew\u201d in the Reconstructionist program was its sociopolitical extension and the demands it made for the Christian participation in and redefinition of the entirety<\/em> of culture; the quiet and unobtrusive toleration of Christianity\u00a0at the behest of religious privileges granted by the state, situated at the outer limits of culture, was forcibly rejected as apostate.<\/em> Consequently, it was attacked in a far more broad and systematic manner from 1987 to 1990, both from within lay Christianity\u00a0and from within multidenominational seminaries. As McVicar demonstrates, these later attacks formed the basis of a critical narrative that was used in virtually every <\/a>subsequent attack on Reconstructionism\u00a0and dominion theology.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

These attacked dominionism\u00a0in two main ways:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. It\u2019s optimistic eschatology.<\/li>\n
  2. It\u2019s theonomy.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    This chapter considers these in turn and evaluates whether these criticisms have proved to be intellectually successful.<\/p>\n

    Eschatological Criticism<\/h3>\n

    Dominionists of the Reformed\u00a0tradition, such as Rushdoony\u00a0and North, were exclusively postmillennial. Most modern dominionists, with a few exceptions, are postmillennial or maintain an \u201coperational\u201d eschatology\u00a0that approximates to postmillennialism. As described in chapter 2, postmillennialism has historically been the most controversial of the eschatological groupings, so it is of little surprise that dominionists are attacked because they are or sound like postmillennialists. House and Ice, in criticizing Reconstructionism, make the blanket statement, \u201cOne cannot be a Reconstructionist and a premillennialist.\u201d[3]<\/a> Similarly, Hal Lindsey, author of the most populist eschatological works of the 1970s and 1980s, wrote,<\/p>\n

    There used to be a group called \u201cpostmillennialists.\u201d . . . World War I greatly disheartened this group and World War II virtually wiped out this viewpoint. No self-respecting<\/em> scholar . . . today . . . is a \u201cpostmillennialist.\u201d[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

    Lindsey attacks dominion theology\u00a0at book length by directly associating its prophetic viewpoint with the rise of the Holocaust:<\/p>\n

    I believe we are witnessing a growing revival of the same false interpretation of prophecy that in the past led to such tragedy for so many centuries by a movement that calls itself either Reconstructionism, Dominionism\u00a0and\/or Kingdom Now.[5]<\/a>
    \n    <\/a><\/p>\n

    Walvoord, in a more scholarly fashion, cites the following central objections: \u201cPostmillennialism in itself does not have the principle or method to attain a system of theology.\u201d He then enumerates his reasoning:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. The viewpoint is \u201cnot apostolic,\u201d thus implicitly invalid for the Christian loyal to the historic faith.<\/li>\n
    2. Whitby-ism (after DanielWhitby, the \u201cfounder\u201d of postmillennialism) was philosophically humanistic, liberal, and non-Christian.<\/li>\n
    3. It is based on a subjective, figurative interpretation of prophecy.[6]<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      A famous and radical rejection of dominionism\u00a0based on points (a) and (b) was found in Dave Hunt\u2019s 1980s triplet Whatever Happened to Heaven<\/em>, The Seduction of Christianity<\/em>, and Beyond Seduction.<\/em> Hunt\u2019s thesis was that the dominion movement was adopting \u201cworldly\u201d aims of personal success using \u201ccarnal\u201d methods of positive confession and self-fulfillment. These, he posited, were concepts borrowed from sociology and psychology, foreign to the classical pietism and the way of victory through suffering: \u201cThey misunderstand true victory. . .. Jesus conquers sin, death, and hell by allowing His enemies to kill Him.\u201d[7]<\/a> The kingdom\u00a0for Hunt was to be considered exclusively part of a new heaven and a new earth. On this basis, it is a misdirection of Christian energy, a distraction from the true mission of the church (which is evangelism), and is ultimately a demonic seduction to engage in culture with a view to transformation:<\/p>\n

      Although the kingdom begins in the hearts of all who obey Christ as King, the outward manifestation of this kingdom will not come in its fullness until God has destroyed this present universe and created a new one into which sin will never enter.[8]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Hunt epitomized the mainstream evangelical\u00a0theological reaction to dominionism. Modern evangelicalism\u00a0in the 1980s was becoming increasingly dispensationalist in its commitments, and the \u201crapture\u201d was a popular, publicly prominent article of faith, with many expecting the grand departure of the church in 1988.[9]<\/a> This increasingly dominant stream of <\/a>evangelicalism\u00a0had inherited an instinctive suspicion of social programs and political involvement from the early fundamentalists, who had historically viewed it as a \u201cdistraction\u201d from the work of evangelism. McVicar summarizes this view as representative of the belief that dominionism was a \u201chubristic . . . attempt to Christianize a chronically un-Christianizable world.\u201d[10]<\/a> More sophisticated critiques employing the same basic ideas were presented to the neo-evangelical[11]<\/a> academy and laity by a broad coalition of liberal and moderate evangelicals:<\/p>\n

      At the turn of the century . . . Abraham Kuyper\u00a0was elected prime minister of the Netherlands. His opponents voiced fears of theocratic oppression. Instead his administration was a model of tolerance and public pluralism . . . that the legitimate rights of all be fully represented. . .. If Christians today understood this distinction between the role of the private Christian citizen and the Christian in government, they might sound less like medieval crusaders.[12]<\/a><\/p>\n

      As Rushdoony\u00a0had appealed directly to Kuyper\u00a0for his philosophical and theological inspiration, this was a pointed attack.<\/p>\n

      Theonomical Criticisms<\/h3>\n

      Neo-Evangelicals and Theonomy<\/h4>\n

      The Reconstructionist belief in the continuing role of the Old Testament law as normative for the Christian provoked what North described as an \u201cecclesiastical war against biblical law.\u201d[13]<\/a> Coverage within both the secular and Christian press became sensationalist, with even the more scholarly attempts at rebuttal sometimes reverting to evocative images of theonomists advocating capital punishment for homosexuals, adultery, the insane, and <\/a>rebellious teenagers.[14]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Much was made of Bahnsen\u2019s view that every \u201cjot and tittle\u201d of the law was binding for the New Testament believer, to the extent he formally responded to it on multiple occasions in subsequent editions of theonomy\u00a0and also explicated the position further with two new books during the second half of the 1980s.[15]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Within the American context, there had been the suspicion that theonomical beliefs were incompatible with constitutional guarantees of religious freedom.[16]<\/a> This idea had a powerful emotive imagery for the <\/a>American<\/em> evangelical. The \u201cdemocracy works\u201d idiom was even articulated by charismatics who had otherwise adopted large portions of Reconstructionism\u2019s program.[17]<\/a> Theonomists were thus portrayed as anti-American<\/em> and anti-democratic rather than just defective on issues of theological principle.[18]<\/a> It boiled over when Billy Graham\u2019s Christianity<\/em>\u00a0Today<\/em> ran a cover story of an \u201cextended expos\u00e9\u201d on Reconstructionism, which labeled Rushdoony\u00a0as a \u201cheretic.\u201d[19]<\/a><\/p>\n

      It was argued that \u201ctheonomists\u201d were unevangelical because of their emphasis on law, political, and civic engagement rather than \u201csaving souls.\u201d This sounded very much like a recapitulation of Hunt\u2019s criticism and the criticism of House and Ice. In other words, this<\/em> was the central<\/em> objection to the Reconstructionist position. The pressure from mainstream neo-evangelicalism\u00a0was such that Pat Robertson denied any formal links with the movement during his presidential bid of 1988, despite having hosted Rushdoony\u00a0and North\u00a0numerous times during the 1980s on his flagship 700 Club<\/em>.<\/p>\n

      Westminster Seminary and Theonomy<\/h4>\n

      The single major attempt at a concerted academic<\/em> response from within the same theological family as Reconstructionism\u00a0to theonomy\u00a0was attempted by Westminster Theological Seminary, where Van Til\u00a0himself had taught.[20]<\/a> It was ten years in the making and was thus intended and expected to be a theologically rigorous and authoritative critique of dominionism. We will <\/a>evaluate this assertion in the section below when I consider the response of the dominionists to the book, but if the book can be said to have a coherent theological thrust, it is expressed with the Hunt-like appeal to piety, \u201c[the] authority\u00a0of the people of God is the authority of weakness,\u201d which was developed in the final chapter of the book with an appeal to the theonomists for a doctrinal and political pluralism:<\/p>\n

      Such [a mix of religion and politics] warn evangelicals interested in a biblical view of society to give care to safeguard the formal principle of the Reformation. Do not mix the Gospel with an overly precise, potentially extra-biblical application of the Law . . . confusing revelation with tradition.[21]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Assessing the Criticisms<\/h3>\n

      Eschatological Criticisms<\/h4>\n

      We noted first that House and Ice, in criticizing Reconstructionism, made the blanket statement, \u201cOne cannot be a Reconstructionist and a premillennialist.\u201d[22]<\/a> This, on the face of it, is a categorical statement that was theologically implausible even when it was written, for we have already argued classical premillennialism\u00a0was triumphant in its eschatology; and many modern premillennialists within the Word of Faith\u00a0and Pentecostal\u00a0movements believe in social reform\u00a0and do hold the two positions in an operational<\/em> sense. The most we need to concede is that the theology of these latter movements may seem muddled and unintuitive to those like Walvoord and Pentecost, critiquing it from a premillennial perspective. This is reversible logic though as the reciprocal view has also been expressed: there have been plenty of Reconstructionists like Bahnsen\u00a0and Gentry who have argued it is \u201cschizophrenic\u201d to claim to be Reconstructionist and yet to try to cling to a premillennial dispensationalism.[23]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Both sides of the argument, then, apparently converge in agreement. Either inflection of the argument might be considered as making the same logical error, but this is mitigated because the primary theological<\/em> problem is the dispensationalist<\/em> element rather than the premillennial aspect. Indeed, other premillennialists have explicitly argued that premillennialism\u00a0<\/a>and reconstructionism\u00a0are not fundamentally at odds with each other.[24]<\/a> That is, for clarity, what should have been said was that \u201cone cannot be a Reconstructionist and<\/em> a modern dispensationalist,\u201d which, as we have seen, has as one of its central distinctives an intensely pessimistic and cynical perspective regarding culture generally. Modern amillennialism\u00a0might also be a better fit in this same category, with its pessimistic cultural indifference, as might some modern \u201cprophetic\u201d viewpoints that argue for agnosticism to sociopolitical conditions.[25]<\/a> Thus, in summary, the eschatological arguments are very weak and do not prove what they claim: it is perfectly permissible to be a premillennialist and a Reconstructionist. Indeed, with the extension of dominionism\u00a0into the wider evangelical\u00a0consciousness, it might be argued this is now the more common<\/em> position amongst the Pentecostals and Word of Faith\u00a0denominations.<\/p>\n

      Next, we considered Lindsey, the very popular writer of the 1970s and 1980s, and the ad hominem<\/em> assault of his that no \u201cself-respecting\u201d scholar would be postmillennial. It is tempting to assert that this can be simply dismissed as an ignorant insult; there are plenty of \u201cself-respecting\u201d scholars who have been or are postmillennial. These scholars, and I count myself amongst them, feel that the overall arc of Scripture\u00a0pushes in an optimistic and victorious consummation of the church prior to the return of the Lord as King, even if the premillennial thesis has the compelling feature of biblical literalism on its side. Indeed, it could readily be argued that Lindsey\u2019s apocalyptic prognostications of rapture\u00a0and nuclear Armageddon through the 1970s and 1980s, all of which failed, render his scholarship as of insufficient quality that no \u201cself-respecting\u201d scholar would consider it worthy of serious attention, unless it was yet another case study in the sociological and psychological pathology surrounding the rapture\u00a0and Armageddon.<\/p>\n

      However, his claim that it lends itself to antisemitism and a Jewish Holocaust requires further examination because of the seriousness of the charge. First, on Lindsey\u2019s own admission, he was merely picking up on the speculative appendix to House and Ice (who he quoted often) that the allegorical and symbolic prophetic viewpoint lends itself to a reduction in the importance of Israel as a nation and this, in turn, has been the historical root of antisemitism and the Holocaust.[26]<\/a> Firstly, this has some <\/a>enormous leaps of logic, and it is hardly defensible that the \u201chistorical root\u201d of antisemitism is principally or necessarily (in the logical sense) related to replacement theology. You can believe in replacement theology and have no animus towards the Jewish nation at all; indeed, you can conclude that evangelism of the modern state of Israel must be executed on the same basis as any other nation.<\/p>\n

      It is nonsense to assert that consistent amillennialists and postmillennialists find themselves pulled inexorably towards antisemitism; some might<\/em> have been convinced by the polemics of Luther\u00a0to move in that direction, but historically, antisemitism was added into Christian theology for other political or social reasons, often just an outright envy of the cultural successes of the Jews and a desire to appropriate their wealth with some pseudo-justification.[27]<\/a> So, for example, Sloyan, as a Jewish intellectual and writer for the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, establishes definitively that the roots of modern<\/em> antisemitism are ethnic and racial animosity to the Jews, the religious component growing weaker with the passing of the centuries.[28]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Anti-Jewish hatred has often centered around the perceived economic<\/em> advantage of the Jews that served as the template for the broader antisemitism. Hitler assaulted the Jews because he felt, in doing so, he would protect the racial, social, and economic integrity of the German republic that he believed had been hijacked by Jewish bankers; any religious element was subsidiary and only useful as providing some kind of moral compensation for the subsequent atrocity.[29]<\/a> However, and more importantly, we now have the benefit of a gap of thirty-five years to test Lindsey\u2019s thesis that Reconstruction <\/a>leads to \u201cholocaust\u201d and antisemitism; it has simply been shown in the years subsequent his positing of this thesis, as with his other eschatological theses considered above, to have been historically incorrect.<\/em><\/p>\n

      Whilst there are undoubtedly those who are dominionists that Lindsey presents as antisemitic in language, it seems equally true there are those who he does not mention, such as Schlissel, who are dominionists, Jewish, and have added an additional element to Reconstructionist theology that recognizes the importance of prophetic Israel.[30]<\/a> In summary, Lindsey\u2019s attack was novel and ambitious but logically tenuous and seems clearly without theological rigor:<\/p>\n

      Dispensationalists believe that the Jewish people have a title to the land that transcends virtually any other consideration. . . . The reconstructionist, on the other hand, makes a distinction. He believes that the Jewish people may exercise the title [to the land] only when they comply with the condition of repentance and faith. He has nothing against Jews living in \u201cEretz Yisrael\u201d per se, but he recognizes that the far more significant question is Israel\u2019s faith. . . . If one\u2019s heart\u2019s desire and prayer to God for Israel agrees with the inspired Apostle\u2019s as recorded in Romans 10, can he thereby be called antisemitic?[31]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Of more substance were the academic critiques of Walvoord. The main assertion of Walvoord was that postmillennialism\u00a0\u201ccannot attain a system of theology.\u201d However, though argued at length by Walvoord, it has been demonstrated that it cannot be sustained on careful examination, and Walvoord\u2019s methodology itself became questionable under critique. Bahnsen\u00a0characterized Walvoord\u2019s process as \u201cnewspaper exegesis\u201d employing an abandonment of Reformed\u00a0principles of exegesis to accommodate the \u201csigns of the times.\u201d[32]<\/a> He returns with interest Walvoord\u2019s dismissive theological criticism:<\/p>\n

      By means of such newspaper exegesis, one could just as well discount the return of Christ in glory, saying \u201cwhere is the promise of his coming?\u201d (cf. II Peter 3:1\u20134). This reductio ad absurdum<\/em> must be reckoned with. The fact that an era of gospel prosperity and world peace has not yet arrived would no more disprove the Bible\u2019s teaching that such an era shall be realized (in the power of God\u2019s <\/a>spirit and the faithfulness of Christ\u2019s church to its great commission) than the fact that Christ has not yet returned disproves the Bible\u2019s teaching that such an event shall take place![33]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Bahnsen\u00a0then argued further at great length that there was a prima facie case to recognize postmillennialism\u00a0consistently within the history of the church.<\/p>\n

      Similarly, Bahnsen, Gentry, and Rushdoony\u00a0all made the case that it is just historically<\/em> disingenuous to present postmillennialism\u00a0as the modern aberration when dispensationalism\u00a0most certainly has a history and theology that can be traced back no earlier<\/em> than 1820\u201330.[34]<\/a> Most importantly, it becomes evident that the major error of Walvoord, in seeking to ensure the cogency of his critique, is that he seems to assume a seamless transition into dispensationalism from classical premillennialism, which is emphatically not<\/em> the case, as we argued in an earlier chapter. Further, Gentry has also mounted a substantive theological and exegetical defense of postmillennialism.[35]<\/a> Likewise, Bahnsen\u00a0and Gentry have individual and joint works where they emphasized the novel character of dispensational thought and the poor quality of scholarship as characteristic of the modern dispensational premillennialism. Taken together, this body of work has certainly met the challenge of Walvoord to present a \u201csystem of theology.\u201d<\/p>\n

      Bahnsen\u00a0is even more specific on this last point by highlighting important figures within the dispensationalist movement (Newton, Zahn, Darby) who had views that implicitly advocated an abdication of social responsibility, because it was an inevitable conclusion from their logic of an apostate Laodicean dispensation, to which the church had now entered. This became explicit with the first wave of fundamentalists denouncing it as a \u201cdistraction\u201d from evangelism. The schism with classical premillennialism\u00a0is obvious at that point; Christians were known throughout the early period of the church for both their premillennialism and their charity. There were even contemporary classical premillennialists such as Schnittger who claimed that dispensationalism\u00a0had produced a deadly malaise within the arena of social and political action.[36]<\/a> Schnittger, a premillennialist but also self-confessedly a Reconstructionist (and thus a living, breathing contradiction for some of <\/a>Reconstruction\u2019s critics), in a few short pages, unconsciously exposes and refutes not only the dispensationalism\u00a0of House, Ice, Lindsey, and Hunt but also undermines neo-evangelicalism\u2019s central attack that there is something inherently \u201cunbiblical\u201d or \u201cunevangelical\u201d about Reconstructionism\u00a0or dominionism\u00a0generally.<\/p>\n

      He elegantly makes the point that whilst he can judge the \u201cpostmils\u201d as wanting in their allegorical use of prophecy, this does not invalidate the theological verity of their overall focus of the victory in Jesus and the increasing glory manifesting within the church as history progresses.[37]<\/a> This<\/em> focus, as we have also previously demonstrated, was the classical premillennialist view also.[38]<\/a> Thus, an answer is also provided here to neo-evangelicalism\u2019s view that historical optimism or triumphalism reflects an import of non-Christian psychological ideas into the church. It was rather an expression of the Reformation\u00a0that reestablished the principles of vocational domains and an ever-increasing glory within the church. In the light of this overall pattern of reasoning, the bankruptcy of the dispensationalist position is seen at its worst, as we consider that the neo-evangelical\u00a0analysis of Hunt effectively places the Reformers in the place of deception, for the Reformers proposed a duty and obligation upon Christians to build the kingdom and establish secular authorities that honor God\u2019s law.[39]<\/a><\/p>\n

      However, some academic criticism is worthy of further attention. We must recognize the validity of Riddlebarger\u2019s qualification that there are issues of nomenclature that postmillennialists tend to minimize in order to claim many who may be more historically judged to have been amillennialists.[40]<\/a> The obvious cases of questionable appropriation here are Augustine\u00a0and the early reformers, Luther\u00a0and Calvin.[41]<\/a><\/p>\n

      This tendency is clearly seen <\/a>in Bahnsen\u2019s essays, the work of Kik, and that of Boettner.[42]<\/a> However, taking a step back, the debatable ascriptions can furnish further proof for our<\/em> argument rather than detracting from it. The argument we<\/em> have made is that there was a shift in thinking for both premillennialists and amillennialists away from their historical positions, emphasizing victory to culturally pessimistic and spiritually pietistic ones. Riddlebarger has correctly identified this change, but it does not defeat the central concept that the victorious mode of thinking now associated with postmillennialism\u00a0had historical precedent within the history of the church, and in those figures especially. Bahnsen, for example, does an exceptional job in indicating the victorious expectation of a world subdued by the gospel in Calvin, regardless of whether his final status is better considered as amillennial.<\/p>\n

      We consider next the neo-evangelical\u00a0Colson\u2019s attack on the dominionists, which was a stream well represented both within the academy and the popular Christian press. Firstly, Colson had a rhetorical pattern like that of Hunt, a fellow neo-evangelical, who we have mentioned earlier in the discussion. He had wanted to consolidate the impression within mainstream traditional evangelicalism\u00a0of Reconstructionism\u00a0as extreme and undemocratic. This clearly had traction amongst a section of the target readership of Christianity<\/em>\u00a0Today. <\/em>It is also clear that there were evangelicals, charismatics, and Pentecostals who were initially persuaded by Jimmy Swaggart\u2019s concurrent accusation of Reconstructionism as \u201cliberation theology in disguise.\u201d There were, and still are, those who fix an unscalable wall between religion and politics and whose faith is incidental to their \u201csecular\u201d activities.<\/p>\n

      Yet, Swaggart\u2019s condemnation of Reconstructionism\u00a0seemed anachronistic, even as he made it, as his fellow charismatic and Pentecostal\u00a0ministers were increasingly and actively embracing dominionism. He himself had even inadvertently recommended Gary DeMar\u2019s God and Government<\/em> before realizing he was a postmillennial Reconstructionist. Robert Tilton\u2019s charismatic television ministry networked, by deliberate act, thousands of charismatic ministers with the Reconstructionists through conferences and satellite technology, with North\u2019s and Rushdoony\u2019s work finding its way into Oral Roberts University Law School and Falwell\u2019s Liberty University.[43]<\/a><\/p>\n

      <\/a>Secondly, we have already noted that Colson\u2019s appeal to the pluralism of Kuyper\u00a0was novel and pointed, knowing the influence of Kuyper on Rushdoony, as was his important and correct distinction between the role of the private and the governmental. However, contra Colson, Rushdoony had<\/em> clearly distinguished between Kuyper\u2019s theological and political legacies. He had also very clearly understood the distinction, like Lloyd-George after him, of the role of private Christian citizen and the Christian in government.[44]<\/a> Far from being a modern crusader eager to impose a theocracy, Rushdoony was family-centric and believed in a small state focused solely on its primary tasks of providing a mechanism of justice and of securing the borders of the nation. He viewed families and communities accountable to God before the state or the church. Where Rushdoony was critical of modern Western democracies, it was because of their humanism\u00a0rather than democracy per se.<\/em><\/p>\n

      Similarly, Rushdoony\u00a0elsewhere had argued for a Christian basis for American history and his sociological prescription for reform\u00a0was not an ecclesiocratic one.[45]<\/a> This was not the revival of either a Catholic\u00a0or Protestant\u00a0hegemony. Rather this is a full participation in the processes of governance and the progress of the humanities and the sciences. For both Rushdoony and Lloyd-George, the Christian did not cease to be a Christian because he was in government, but his Christianity\u00a0had to inform his very practice within government. This is also why Kuyper, at the opening of the Free University of Amsterdam, which he had founded, famously exploded the myth of the \u201csecular\u201d and the \u201creligious,\u201d declaring, \u201cThere is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all<\/em>, does not cry: \u2018Mine!\u2019\u201d[46]<\/a> Most pointedly, the focus of the university right from the beginning was not just on theological studies but on scientific and technological ones as well, reflecting Kuyper\u2019s philosophy of \u201csphere sovereignty.\u201d[47]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Likewise, Lloyd-George had argued vigorously through the 1960s for Christians who were both experts in their domains and<\/em> scripturally literate;<\/a> it was the duty and task of the Christian professional association to work out how their Christianity\u00a0should affect the working of their profession.[48]<\/a> It might also be said that history has simply overturned the central charge of neo-evangelicals against dominionism\u00a0of heresy because of their emphasis on social and political action. In most of the new churches within areas of the world where there has been little or no representative government, the church has had to address social and political issues as much as they have had to address spiritual ones. By necessity, they have adopted aggressive political activism and the rhetoric of victory and societal change.[49]<\/a><\/p>\n

      It can even be argued that the reconfiguration of the evangelical\u00a0movement, because of the influence of dominionism, has meant that neo-evangelicalism\u00a0itself has tended to have become marginalized as the primary Christian voice within the explosive growth experienced by these nondenominational churches. The rapidly growing neo-Pentecostal\u00a0movement and the \u201cfifth wave\u201d postmodern experiential churches are often informed, admittedly, in sometimes a muddled or partially formed manner, by a dominion theology\u00a0that asserts sphere sovereignty\u00a0and seeks to transform and reform\u00a0every aspect of culture.[50]<\/a> This \u201cnew wine\u201d dominionism may lack the coherence and abrasiveness of a Rushdoony\u00a0or North, with their preference for a \u201ccompassionate Reformers\u201d mantle, but it is now the new normal for the reformer or activist, be they evangelical, charismatic, or Pentecostal. Thus, for the neo-evangelicals of the Hunt and Colson ilk, their attack was ultimately based on straw man arguments.<\/p>\n

      Theonomical Criticisms Assessed<\/h4>\n

      Of much greater significance theologically was the response to theonomy. The central force of the criticisms examined previously was that theonomy represents a reversion to pre-Christian legalism and a philosophical dogmatism, with the critics appealing instead to a pluralistic epistemology\u00a0derived from natural law. For Bahnsen, it was almost trivial to dismiss the first part of this charge. Legalism<\/em> is the saving by works but theonomy\u00a0is seen as the means<\/em> of the ministration of grace for sanctification:<\/p>\n

      <\/a>[They] fail to see the relevance of God\u2019s law as the way of sanctification and as the law of men and nations. They do not recognize God\u2019s law as God\u2019s plan . . . for godly authority\u00a0and rule in every area of life. This anti-law attitude guarantees impotence and defeat to all churches who hold it.[51]<\/a><\/p>\n

      That is, he adeptly dealt with all the criticisms leveled at him with the simple assertion that the criticisms of him were normally substantial misunderstandings of what theonomy was.<\/em>[52]<\/strong><\/em><\/a> Theonomy had never claimed to be a way of salvation <\/em>but was<\/em> the way of sanctification. <\/em>Both Bahnsen\u00a0and Rushdoony\u00a0had anticipated this mode of criticism and had thoroughly refuted it in advance.[53]<\/a><\/p>\n

      The second part of the criticism was also swiftly dealt with. It is important to recognize that theonomy\u00a0was<\/em> the orthodox Reformed\u00a0position held by both Luther\u00a0and Calvin. Paradoxically, for the writers of Westminster\u2019s critique of theonomy, the founder of Westminster, nearly half a century earlier, had also asserted a theonomical pretext for his belief in societal reformation:<\/p>\n

      It is perfectly clear what is wrong. The law of God has been torn up . . . and the inevitable result [what is wrong with the world] is appearing with ever greater clearness. When will the law be rediscovered?[54]<\/a><\/p>\n

      It seems the critics were chronically ill-informed or had deliberately chosen to ignore their own denominational catechisms and the epistemological\u00a0foundation of their own seminary. The critique offered was anything but coherent, based on a fuzzy natural-law epistemology, as<\/p>\n

      McDade also observes,<\/p>\n

      Van Til\u00a0was no pioneer in the field of ethics; he was simply restating<\/em> the Reformed\u00a0Faith of the Heidelberg Catechism . . . and the Westminster Larger Catechism.[55]<\/a><\/p>\n

      Bahnsen, in contrast, had<\/em> understood the implications of Van Til\u2019s philosophy and the logical outworkings of Westminster\u2019s founding principles. This is evidenced by the fact that Van Til had recognized him as his most <\/a>able student and had wanted him to succeed him at Westminster.<\/p>\n

      Bahnsen\u00a0simply extended logically Van Til\u2019s restatement of the Reformed\u00a0hermeneutic to the civil realm using Rushdoony\u2019s framework.[56]<\/a> This he elaborated in the preface to his second edition of Theonomy<\/em>, stating that when he spoke of the \u201cjot and the tittle\u201d of the law, he was not \u201crequiring observance of ancient cultural details\u201d but was applying the primary Reformed\u00a0exegetical procedure that it is the underlying principles of the law, which \u201chas abiding ethical validity.\u201d[57]<\/a> This sense of \u201cjot and tittle\u201d is the Van Tillian axiom that every sphere and aspect of humanity\u2019s existence is subject to the law and jurisdiction of God as his creation: \u201cAll the facts of nature and of history are what they are, do what they do, and undergo what they undergo, in accord with the one comprehensive counsel of God.\u201d[58]<\/a><\/p>\n

      An autonomous realm of humankind is antithetical to the Reformed\u00a0faith. Thus, theonomy, understood philosophically, is the theological, logical, and temporal continuity between all<\/em> Scripture\u00a0and all<\/em> human life. That is, if someone consistently follows the logic of Scripture, the same conclusions about the implications of the law for Christian ethics can be arrived at by those not sharing the denominational Reformed\u00a0heritage. Thus, Cope, one of the founders of YWAM, stated it thus:<\/p>\n

      In Matthew 5 Jesus makes it clear that the entire Old Testament is the foundation for his message and his actions. . . . We do not reinterpret the Old Testament with the New, nor the New with the Old, but rather see them as a four-thousand-year line of thought that God is building. . . . In other words, greatness in the kingdom of God is being able to marry and live both Old and New Testament values. The Old Testament emphasizes nations and how we live together as a community here on earth, and the New Testament emphasizes the individual, salvation, and reaching the lost for a future in heaven. These must be married to see God and his kingdom\u00a0clearly. . . . There is only one place to go in order to understand the specific definitions God gave to these terms. We must go to the law of Moses and the rest of the Old Testament. In Scripture, God has given us a set of values by which to measure and correct our own personal and cultural definitions of reality.\u201d[59]<\/a>
      \n      <\/a>
      \nThis is precisely<\/em> what Bahnsen\u00a0meant when he considered the law as the means<\/em> of sanctification\u2014<\/em>the correction<\/em> of our own personal and cultural definitions of reality.<\/p>\n

      Summary and Concluding Remarks<\/h3>\n

      From a theological perspective, each of the criticisms we considered above appear to reduce to a variation on the classic fundamentalist\u00a0position that somehow political involvement will \u201ccontaminate\u201d the gospel message and Christians should avoid such involvement for that reason. Stated in that fashion, it should be clear that such a position is prima facie unacceptable and unscriptural; believers are called to be salt and light, and to \u201coccupy [do the business of governing on my behalf] till [I, Jesus] come.\u201d[60]<\/a> It is also true that virtually no major Christian thinkers in history have maintained that position and others, such as Machen and Finney, with very different theologies, have argued passionately against it; the withdrawal of the fundamentalist movement from the wider culture was an aberration in Christian history.<\/p>\n

      We can see that neither the attacks on the eschatology nor the attacks on the theonomy\u00a0of dominionism\u00a0were anywhere close to definitive or were even of sufficient force to undermine support for the movement. In fact, to the frustration of many critics, the controversy had the side effect of raising the awareness of mainstream evangelicalism\u00a0to dominionism and disseminating its ideas even more widely, as \u201csofter\u201d versions more acceptable to the evangelical\u00a0community developed. Thus, consequently, in the contemporary milieu, it is rare for the term \u201cReconstructionism\u201d to be used, but its ideas and programs are very much alive.<\/p>\n

      When it came to Westminster\u2019s decade-in-the-making \u201ccritique\u201d of theonomy, we must concur first with North that Westminster\u2019s attempts at refutation were simply the \u201cworst writing\u201d by any of the seminary staff who contributed to the book; second, with McDade in asserting that it simply showed they were not prepared to engage seriously with the political and social implications of their own historical Reformed\u00a0heritage. The latter had been restated with logical clarity by their institutional founder and their first professor of apologetics, and worked out in detail sociologically by their<\/em> finest students of a generation.[61]<\/a> It is now a historical fact<\/a> that none of critiques of dominion theology that it included proved persuasive to any but the most partisan of reader. Theologically and rhetorically, the Reconstructionists had anticipated the criticisms and answered them quickly and forcibly in print. This academic response to Westminster\u2019s \u201ccritique\u201d was of a far more rigorous and researched quality, as evidenced by the editors\u2019 extended rebuttal and exposure of the former\u2019s poor academic quality.[62]<\/a><\/p>\n

      However, that was not to say that the decade and a half of ferocious criticism had no consequences. Bahnsen\u00a0was never to teach within a Reformed\u00a0seminary after his dismissal, becoming an independent scholar and starting his own study center. After his premature death, some new colleges and seminaries did attempt to continue his legacy, and some of his most notable students are working today in Reformed\u00a0contexts derived from those new institutions. The most noticeable, more general negative effects of the level of publicity generated by the criticisms were for some to disassociate from what were considered the most \u201cextreme\u201d of Reconstructionist views, with leaders such as the elder Schaeffer and Falwell failing to give the Reconstructionists any credit for the platform built on their foundation. Thus, it accentuated the differences between Reformed\u00a0and the evangelical\u00a0dominion theologies of, say, Wagner, with the latter clearly attempting to publicly distance themselves from the more controversial theonomical language, such as \u201ctheocracy\u201d or \u201cecclesiocracy,\u201d and to adopt a softer idiom, even if these terms were being commonly misrepresented and misunderstood by the critics.<\/p>\n

      Nevertheless, in summary, the dominionist arguments have proved persuasive, survived, and thrived through the criticism. It should again be accepted that society cannot be changed or improved without political engagement and representation of the Christian view in the organs of power and at all the different levels of governance, from school, local community, county, state, and parliament. It is to how the Christian should engage that we now turn, with the help of the most distinguished British intellectual evangelical\u00a0of the post-WWII period, Dr. David Martyn Lloyd-Jones\u00a0(d. 1981), recognized as one of the finest expositional preachers ever. We develop our political philosophy\u00a0with his assistance in the next chapter, and we demonstrate the scriptural basis for our involvement.<\/p>\n

      \n

      [1]<\/a> Technically, Bahnsen\u00a0was not dismissed, his contract was just not renewed\u2014RTS, at the time, employed everyone on single-year contracts; but it was exceptionally unusual to be terminated outside of misconduct. Bahnsen\u00a0had even been an associate professor there as a postgraduate student studying for a PhD from 1976; he graduated with his PhD in 1978 and was \u201cdismissed\u201d in 1979. His academic record was exceptional, and he was a gifted teacher; there were clearly deeper reasons. His own initially private and extensive account of what happened is found here: Bahnsen, \u201cWhat Really Happened.\u201d<\/p>\n

      [2]<\/a> McVicar, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, 203\u20135.<\/p>\n

      [3]<\/a> House and Ice, Dominion Theology<\/em>, 7.<\/p>\n

      [4]<\/a> Lindsey, Late Great Planet Earth<\/em>, 164\u201365. Emphasis added.<\/p>\n

      [5]<\/a> Lindsey, Road to Holocaust<\/em>, 25.<\/p>\n

      [6]<\/a> Walvoord, \u201cMillennium Issue,\u201d 23.<\/p>\n

      [7]<\/a> Hunt, Beyond Seduction, 262. A similar thought has been restated recently in Stark, Prophets, Politics, and Nations.<\/p>\n

      [8]<\/a> Hunt, Beyond Seduction<\/em>, 224.<\/p>\n

      [9]<\/a> This was based on a specific interpretation of Matt 24:32\u201334. The \u201cfig tree\u201d is taken to symbolize the nation of Israel. The phrase \u201cbecomes tender and puts out leaves\u201d refers to the reformation of the nation, which occurred in 1948. A \u201cgeneration\u201d in Israel was forty years, so the generation that sees the reformation of the state of Israel was the rapture\u00a0generation\u2014impeccable and full of prophetic insight, but catastrophically incorrect.<\/p>\n

      [10]<\/a> McVicar, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, 206.<\/p>\n

      [11]<\/a> The distinction between \u201cneo-evangelical\u201d and \u201cpost-evangelical\u201d is examined in appendix A.<\/p>\n

      [12]<\/a> Colson, \u201cPower Illusion,\u201d 34.<\/p>\n

      [13]<\/a> North and DeMar, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, xiii.<\/p>\n

      [14]<\/a> Yurica, \u201cDespoiling of America\u201d; Longman, \u201cGod\u2019s Law,\u201d 41, 44; House and Ice, Dominion Theology<\/em>, 63\u201364.<\/p>\n

      [15]<\/a> House and Ice, Dominion Theology<\/em>, 20, 103. As I mentioned in an earlier chapter, the theonomical thesis originated with Rushdoony, but Bahnsen\u00a0was the foremost exegete of it. Though the Tyler split initially affected the relationship between the two men, Bahnsen\u00a0was later to consolidate his relationship with Chalcedon and Rushdoony. He was one of the few within the movement to have the standing to criticize Gary North\u00a0of \u201clogical fallacy\u201d (Bahnsen, \u201cAnother Look at Chilton\u2019s Days of Vengeance<\/em>\u201d) without a ferocious response from North.<\/p>\n

      Bahnsen\u2019s second edition of Theonomy <\/em>appeared in 1984, seven years after the first edition; he added a lengthy second preface as a response to his critics, xi\u2013xxxiii. He was to publish much longer rebuttals as By This Standard<\/em> (1985) and No Other Standard<\/em> (1991); the latter dealt more directly with the critics, the former was more of a lay summary of the academic Theonomy<\/em>; however, in the foreword to the former, he mentions the latter, so there was a considerable delay in publication probably because of the drama surrounding his work and his struggles with his denomination.<\/p>\n

      His magnum opus<\/em> was his Van Til<\/em>\u2019s Apologetic<\/em>, an extensive commentary on and readings from Van Til, which was completed shortly before his untimely death in 1995; it appeared in 1998. A further posthumous work Presuppositional Apologetics<\/em> was in proofing when he passed and remained \u201clost\u201d for over thirty years, only being rediscovered behind a filing cabinet when his office was cleared some sixteen years after his death. This was published in 2008 and was a development of chapters 10 and 11 of the multiauthored work Foundations of Christian Scholarship<\/em> of 1976.<\/em><\/p>\n

      As these essays were written at the beginning of the controversy over his work, and Bahnsen\u00a0worked on them as he went through the various controversies and emerged out the other side, the final editor of the manuscript viewed it as Bahnsen\u2019s most important work, the systematic interpretation of Van Til\u00a0he had sought to bring out in the Apologetic<\/em> (Presuppositional Apologetics<\/em>, vii). On this point, Van Til considered Bahnsen\u00a0to be the best representative of his position, and he was certainly the most rigorous philosophical and theological defender of the Reconstructionist positions.<\/p>\n

      [16]<\/a> In the contemporary context, the debate regarding Islam\u00a0would appear to be significant and relevant here. Some are arguing very publicly for \u201csecularism\u201d in the public square as the only legitimate option to preserve Western values in countries that have allowed mass immigration from Muslim nations. Islam\u00a0is very publicly both a religious and a political system; if Muslims become a majority in a country, they will<\/em> dispense with democracy and minority rights as a matter of principle <\/em>(for more on this, see Ali, Heretic<\/em>, especially the chapters \u201cWhy Has There Been No Muslim Reformation,\u201d \u201cHow Islam\u2019s Harsh Religious Code Keeps Muslims Stuck in the Seventh Century,\u201d and \u201cJihad\u201d; Ali, Prey<\/em>, especially \u201cPart 3: Clashing Civilizations, Revisited\u201d; and Kassam, No Go Zones<\/em>).<\/em> The only obligation a Muslim has is to submit to the revealed word of God in the Qur\u2019anic scriptures (this is the literal meaning of \u201cIslam\u201d).<\/p>\n

      It is easy to confuse this with the theonomical position because is this not just what the Christian theonomists are arguing, the primacy of the old covenant law in the matters of jurisprudence? However, the content<\/em> of the old covenant Scriptures given to Israel clearly delineate representational government and God exhorts his people to \u201cgovern themselves\u201d in civil matters. It is in the practice of the religious cult where God declares and there is no debate.<\/p>\n

      [17]<\/a> Wagner, On Earth<\/em>, 11\u201316.<\/p>\n

      [18]<\/a> McVicar, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, 202\u20135.<\/p>\n

      [19]<\/a> Clapp, \u201cDemocracy as Heresy.\u201d Graham was still actively involved in the magazine at this point, and this condemnation would have appeared authoritative to many evangelicals unsure about the movement.<\/p>\n

      [20]<\/a> Barker and Godfrey, Theonomy<\/em>, 10.<\/p>\n

      [21]<\/a> Davis, \u201cChallenge to Theonomy,\u201d 398\u201399.<\/p>\n

      [22]<\/a> House and Ice, Dominion Theology<\/em>, 7.<\/p>\n

      [23]<\/a> Bahnsen\u00a0and Gentry, House Divided.<\/em><\/p>\n

      [24]<\/a> Schnittger, \u201cChristian Reconstruction.\u201d<\/p>\n

      [25]<\/a> Stark, Prophets, Politics, and Nations<\/em>. A critical response to this perspective was the basis of my Politics<\/em>.<\/p>\n

      [26]<\/a> House and Ice, Dominion Theology<\/em>, 397.<\/p>\n

      [27]<\/a> Macneil, \u201cRise of Christian Anti-Semitism,\u201d para 5. A point I make in the introduction to this essay is that it is unlikely Luther\u00a0would have intended his words to have been used as a justification for outright persecution and the killing of Jews. Both himself and Calvin\u00a0felt that the Papist recourse to violence was one of the elements the Reformation\u00a0needed to separate itself from and that there should be a degree of religious toleration, especially towards the Jews. It is true that they might have failed in their commitment to non-violence when trying to deal with the Anabaptists, and other dissident \u201cradical Reformation\u201d groups, but the point remains that it was highly unlikely that Luther intended his words to be misused in that way or the way that national socialism had exploited them.<\/p>\n

      [28]<\/a> Sloyan, Christian Persecution<\/em>.<\/p>\n

      [29]<\/a> The popularity of the fictional Protocols of the Elders of Zion<\/em> (1903), alleging that there was a worldwide Jewish conspiracy to control the world, was not limited to Russia, where it first appeared, but was popularized by some European and US industrialists (such as Henry Ford, whose \u201cassembly line\u201d was inspirational for Hitler), thus lending it credibility, despite it being quickly discredited as a forgery.<\/p>\n

      [30]<\/a> Schlissel, \u201cReconstructionism,\u201d 56\u201361.<\/p>\n

      [31]<\/a> Schlissel, \u201cReconstructionism,\u201d 59.<\/p>\n

      [32]<\/a> Bahnsen, Theonomy in Christian Ethics<\/em>, 7, 96.<\/p>\n

      [33]<\/a> Bahnsen, \u201cCalvin\u00a0and Postmillennialism,\u201d 10.<\/p>\n

      [34]<\/a> Bahnsen, \u201cCalvin\u00a0and Postmillennialism,\u201d 7; MacPherson, The Rapture Plot<\/em>, viii.<\/p>\n

      [35]<\/a> Gentry, He Shall Dominion<\/em>.<\/p>\n

      [36]<\/a> Schnittger, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, 9\u201310. This was originally a radio program pamphlet intended for a self-study group.<\/p>\n

      [37]<\/a> Schnittger, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, 6. Recent work by \u201cpostmils,\u201d such as Gentry and Mathison, is of a much higher exegetical quality.<\/p>\n

      [38]<\/a> Schnittger, Christian Reconstruction<\/em>, 13.<\/p>\n

      [39]<\/a> It is of note that Hunt wrote a number of works directly attacking Calvin\u00a0as a \u201ctyrant\u201d and Calvinism as misrepresenting God, principally What Love Is This?<\/em> He had modern dominionism\u00a0in mind as he wrote them; indeed, according to the back matter, it was why<\/em> he wrote it.<\/p>\n

      [40]<\/a> Riddlebarger, \u201cPrinceton and the Millennium.\u201d<\/p>\n

      [41]<\/a> It might seem strange to assert that the early Reformers were his putative heirs with a gap of around a thousand years between them, but as Pawson, in his Seminars <\/em>(audio), notes, Calvin\u00a0might \u201cmerely\u201d have been conceived of \u201cwriting down the theology of Augustine in a systematic manner\u201d (Pawson, \u201cGrace\u2014Saving, Sovereign, and Free,\u201d 24:00\u201331:00). See also \u201c<\/em>Assessing Postmillennialism,\u201d 28.<\/p>\n

      [42]<\/a> Bahnsen, \u201cCalvin\u00a0and Postmillennialism\u201d; Bahnsen, \u201cPrima Facie Acceptability of Postmillennialism\u201d; Kik, Eschatology of Victory<\/em>, 3\u201315; Boettner, Postmillennialism<\/em>, loc. 162.<\/p>\n

      [43]<\/a> North, Unholy Spirits<\/em>, 392.<\/p>\n

      [44]<\/a> Beyond the commentary below, we consider in some depth the work of Lloyd-George in our chapter on the philosophy of Christian involvement.<\/p>\n

      [45]<\/a> This being his chief distinctive from Gary North\u2019s reconstructionism, who broke with Rushdoony\u00a0on this issue amongst others. See \u201cSchism and Reformation,\u201d 86.<\/p>\n

      [46]<\/a> Bratt, Abraham Kuyper<\/em>, 488 (emphasis original); a very brief but informative history is found on the university website at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, \u201cHistory.\u201d<\/p>\n

      [47]<\/a> This is clearly exposited in his Lectures on Calvinism<\/em> (1898) and an essay in Bratt\u2019s Centennial Reader<\/em>, \u201cSphere Sovereignty.\u201d<\/p>\n

      [48]<\/a> Lloyd-George, Romans: Exposition of Chapter 13.<\/em><\/p>\n

      [49]<\/a> North, Unholy Spirits<\/em>, 388\u201389.<\/p>\n

      [50]<\/a> Birch-Machin, Speakers of Life<\/em>, 16; Coates, Kingdom Now!<\/em>, 18.<\/p>\n

      [51]<\/a> Rushdoony, God\u2019s Plan for Victory<\/em> loc. 200.<\/p>\n

      [52]<\/a> Bahnsen, Theonomy in Christian Ethics<\/em>, xx\u2013xxvii.<\/p>\n

      [53]<\/a> Bahnsen, Theonomy in Christian Ethics<\/em>, 89, 297, 499.<\/p>\n

      [54]<\/a> Machen, \u201cImportance of Christian Scholarship,\u201d 91.<\/p>\n

      [55]<\/a> McDade, \u201cProblem with Christian Reconstruction,\u201d 2. Emphasis added.<\/p>\n

      [56]<\/a> Hence, the significance that Rushdoony\u00a0wrote the preface to Bahnsen\u2019s Theonomy<\/em> in 1971, though it never appeared until 1977. There was clearly an ongoing conversation between them. See North, Theonomy<\/em>, 17.<\/p>\n

      [57]<\/a> Bahnsen, Theonomy in Christian Ethics<\/em>, xiv\u2013xv.<\/p>\n

      [58]<\/a> Van Til, Christian Apologetics<\/em>, 127.<\/p>\n

      [59]<\/a> Cope, God and Political Justice<\/em>, loc. 306, 484, 1190, 1199.<\/p>\n

      [60]<\/a> See the discussion in the preface exegeting this term and justifying this amplification of the translation, xiii-xiv.<\/p>\n

      [61]<\/a> North, Theonomy<\/em>, 11, 321\u201322. It is also of note that the publisher favored by the seminary declined to publish the work, and a non-Reformed\u00a0publishing house associated with the neo-evangelical movement was used.<\/p>\n

      [62]<\/a> North, Theonomy.<\/em> It is also noteworthy that it took less than a year for North to publish this collection of essays in contrast to the decade it took for the seminary to publish the critique.<\/p>\n

      \n
      \n
      The Dominionist Movement<\/a><\/div>\n
      Political Involvement<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      The Critiques of Dominion Theology Overview Dominion theology\u00a0was always controversial and Bahnsen\u00a0suffered a sustained attack over his Theonomy\u00a0from its publication date in 1977; the dispute over the work eventually led to his \u201cdismissal\u201d from RTS.[1] However, that was a dispute over Reformed\u00a0theology and localized in that movement. It was also a dispute regarding the praxis […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1624,"parent":1636,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1685","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1685"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1685\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1744,"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1685\/revisions\/1744"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1636"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetmacneil.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}