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by John A. Fielding, III

Introduction

Stephen Perks has written a fine work that sets forth his theory of the functioning of a Christian State. Perks' jumping off point for the book is a critique of an article in The Evangelical Quarterly (Vol. LXIX, No. 1 [January, 1997]) by John Coffey entitled, How Should Evangelicals Think About Politics?: Roger Williams and the Case for Principled Pluralism.

To that end, the first part of the book is a critique of the view known as "principled pluralism" which Perks accomplishes through his critique of Coffey's article, while the second part offers Perks' vision of a Christian state.

A Critique of "Principled Pluralism"

Perks begins by critiquing Coffey's premise which Coffey identifies as "the most fundamental question ..." i.e., "is it theologically illegitimate for Christianity be [sic] a state religion?"¹ Perks suggests that the real question for Coffey should be "is it possible for the State to be religiously neutral" because Coffey has set up the ideal state as one which is "non-confessional."² Coffey states that principled pluralists maintain that Christians ought on principle to advocate non-confessional states in which all religions enjoy civil liberty and equality.³ Thus, a "non-confessional state" should tolerate "all religions and ... the state should confine itself to purely secular functions."⁴

After meandering aimlessly through a theological hodge-podge of scholarship to demonstrate the variety of figures that have endorsed the non-confessional approach (the radical Reformers [Anabaptists]; scholars influenced by Abraham Kuyper's Dutch neo-Calvinism, such as Herman Dooyeweerd; neo-evangelicals such as Mark Noll and George Marsden; dispensationalist neo-Thomist Norman Geisler, and Reformed scholars Meredith Kline and William Barker), Coffey fastens upon Roger Williams as a thinker who demonstrates the "deep roots" the principled pluralist position has in the "evangelical protestant tradition."

While Coffey is thus occupied, Perks goes to work on what he identifies as the underlying assumption of the "possibility of neutrality" in a state. Because of the way Coffey has set up his article, Perks is able to show that if Coffey does not deal successfully with this assumption, his argument falls apart. In fact, "there can be no such thing as a non-religious State."⁵ Perks proceeds to demolish the assumption of a religiously-neutral state.

Perks devotes one hundred fifteen pages of his book to critiquing twenty-seven pages of Coffey's article. Now, a good deal may said in favor of a man who enjoys his work.⁶ However, a certain amount of what Perks does is wretched excess. To an extent, this is the fault of Coffey himself. He has taken "non-confessional," "principled pluralist," and all varieties of natural law advocates, and put them together in a kind of witch's brew, ignoring obvious differences. Writing a mess requires no special talent; reviewing it, as Perks demonstrates, proves to be something else again.⁷

The "principled pluralist" position is another name for the position held by Dutch neo-Calvinists in the lineage of Abraham Kuyper, or more exactly, Herman Dooyeweerd. The term was popularized by a conference entitled "Consultation on the Biblical Role of Civil Government," and organized by, among others, the National Reform Association. The principled pluralist position was advocated in its major essay by Gordon Spykman, a follower of Herman Dooyeweerd and professor of theology at Calvin College. In his essay, he specifically rejects "natural law theory, social contract theory, and the theory that the state is autonomous," arguing instead that "the biblical doctrine of the creation order provides a lasting basis for state life."⁸ To lump that position with the neo-Thomist natural law position of Norman Geisler⁹ is just silly and irresponsible. While Perks is correct in criticizing Coffey for identifying "non-confessional" with "religious neutrality," Coffey does not fairly place principled pluralists in this category.¹⁰

Nevertheless, despite the fact that Coffey has massacred the meaning of "principled pluralists" and "non-confessional," Perks must make the best of a bad bargain by laying out the proper role for a magistrate. The proper role for a civil magistrate is to promote the Christian faith through the "upholding of public justice and legal order in society."¹¹ The concepts of "public justice" and "legal order" are, however, hardly religiously neutral subjects. Perks points to the idea of murder. While most societies agree murder should be punished, there exists no consensus concerning what constitutes murder. The reason for the lack of consensus is man seeking to be God, defining good and evil. The only corrective for this perversion is man being elevated to see "public justice" and "legal order" from God's point of view.¹² Thus, for the State to do its job, it must make a religious decision, whether in terms of the true religion or a false religion.

Perks thus points out that no state is "non-confessional."¹³ Whenever a "State undertakes to correct what it considers to be injustice and oppression and reorders the life of society in accordance with its own ideal of justice, it confesses its basic religious convictions,"¹⁴ even if it does not do so with explicit or traditional religious language. Coffey's argument amounts to nonsense: "the very idea of a secular State is a religious idea."¹⁵ Therefore, the question Coffey poses takes on a whole new significance: Coffey wishes to answer the question concerning the legitimacy of Christianity being a state religion in the negative because Coffey believes that it is possible for a state to be bereft of a state religion. However, if the state cannot be bereft of a religion, the question changes to which religion should be the state religion. Of course, Coffey's continued insistence on the ability of the state to be religiously neutral gives Perks the ability to insist the contrary. Over and over. And over. In a variety of ways. In the library, with a pipe wrench. World without end, amen. As I said: wretched excess.

The major support for Coffey's position is that the notion that Christianity should be the state religion came from the magisterial Reformation, which, in turn, was built on an unbiblical foundation of "Constantinianism." "Constantinianism" is defined as the belief "that the conversion of nations to Christianity was God's providential plan and that Christians should work to maintain or create godly nations and states."¹⁶ Coffey then attempts to show that the Constantinian position should not be the proper position by the use of three arguments which Perks refutes in turn.

First, Coffey states that the increasing religious diversity requires principled pluralism.¹⁷ I say "states" because Perks quite rightly points out that Coffey offers no arguments to support this idea. In fact, one could as easily offer the opposite argument: the existence of diversity indicates the vitiation of Christian influence in society, and perhaps the time has come for a more vigorous assertion of a strong position based upon biblical law. We will never know what Coffey's answer would have been since he makes no argument.

Second, Coffey offers the position of Roger Williams as his leading example of principled pluralism which, as an argument drawn from a less religiously diverse age, runs in the opposite direction from his argument for religious diversity.¹⁸ Perks criticizes Coffey for appealing to history without making an effort to support biblically the case for principled pluralism first. Thus, using example, illustration, and metaphor becomes a substitute for reasonable argument based on texts. If Coffey's arguments from Scripture are bad arguments, they will not be lent weight by putting them in an historical figure's mouth. In particular, Coffey and Williams offer up the same old tired argument that has been amply refuted in other places, i.e., that the Reformers ignore the discontinuity between the Testaments. Coffey, in throwing in with the Radical Reformers and dispensationalists, classifies Israel as "utterly unique," including its magistracy. Perks points out that Coffey can only accomplish a completely typological Israel by illegitimately conflating two institutions, the religious leadership and the magistrate's office. Then, when the priesthood is fulfilled, the magistracy disappears as well. Contrary to this, Perks points us to the New Testament passages that demonstrate the continuity of the Old Testament law, such as Rom. 13:1-10 and Matt. 5:17-20, as well as refuting those offered in apparent defense of the scrambling of the two institutions in Israel.

Third, Perks criticizes Coffey's argument for being directly contrary to various texts of Scripture (i.e., Matt. 28:18-20; Rom. 13:1-7; Psa. 2:11-12), with which Coffey does not bother to come to grips. Instead, Coffey offers misinterpretations of the parable of the wheat and the tares (Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43), Luke 9:54-55, 1 Corinthians 5, 2 Corinthians 10:4, Ephesians 6, 1 Peter 2:9, 1 Peter 2:11, and Hebrews 11:13. The parable of the wheat and tares does not (for the umpteenth time) stand for the proposition that crimes committed by unbelievers should not be punished temporally by the civil magistrate according to the standard of God's law. It stands for the proposition that unbelievers should not be punished simply for being unbelievers as such. Their mere status as unbelievers is not an adequate basis for human punishment because their spiritual condition is not within human ability to discern. Thus, human rulers are not to uproot them since in accomplishing such an act, they may be uprooting believers as well. This is completely apart from a consideration of activities contrary to God's law that are subversive of good order as that order is defined by God's Law-Word.¹⁹

Coffey's exegesis of Luke 9:54-55 is even more obscure. He uses Jesus' rebuke of His disciples' desire to call down fire from heaven in judgment upon unbelievers as support for Christian civil magistrates not having regard for religion.²⁰ What this has to do with civil magistrates punishing those who commit acts defined as crimes under biblical law one can only wonder.

Coffey's exegesis of 1 Corinthians 5 misapplies a text directed towards church discipline to the civil magistrate, an example of the conflation of the institutions of church and state of which Perks complains. Coffey does not realize that proper separation of the church and state requires that the church punish the sin of covenantally confessional believers (not unbelievers) and that the state punish the crimes of any who offend biblical law criminally.

Coffey's exegesis of 2 Corinthians 10:4 and Ephesians 6 partakes of the same analysis and same refutation. Because Christians prosecute spiritual warfare with spiritual implements, it does not follow that the state does not now bear the earthly sword in the pursuit of its proper jurisdiction.²¹

Coffey's exegesis of 1 Peter 2:9 attempts to apply the "royal priesthood, holy nation" language in such a way that suggests Christians either may not serve as magistrates because they must apply Christian principles wherever they find themselves, or they must not apply any biblical law because that would violate his principle of "neutrality" or "non-confessionalism." Perks is astounded. Is Coffey really saying that because "the body of Christ is a holy nation, a peculiar people, the magistrate must not respect religion?"²² How does such a conclusion follow?

Finally, Coffey offers exegesis of 1 Peter 2:11 and Hebrews 11:13, which are passages using the language of "strangers and pilgrims." Coffey understands the idea of pilgrimage as referring to our faith being an "other worldly" faith that does not relate to life here, except in a private fashion. He intends us to be "strangers" in the commonly misinterpreted sense that our "kingdom is not of this world." Perks points out that our kingdom is indeed not "of this world": that is, having its origin in the sinful fallen world. It is, instead, a kingdom not having its source in this world, but a faith that transforms and overcomes the world. The citizens of the kingdom of God carry out God's will "on earth, as it is in heaven." If God's will is universal in heaven, Jesus' prayer is that it be universal on earth as well. Thus, the believer's true home is heaven until earth be brought into conformity with it.²³

As Perks points out, "Coffey's use of Scripture to support principled pluralism implies that the Christian virtues are incompatible with the use of the sword by the magistrate." ²⁴ Perks insists that the logical outcome of Coffey's position is that the magistracy is evil, precisely the Anabaptist position, contrary to Romans 13:1-7, a text with which Coffey never interacts. Bizarrely, Coffey insists that only secular, i.e., religiously neutral, states are not evil. As Perks concludes, such a position is not supported by history, logic, or biblical exegesis.²⁵

An Alternative Vision for a Christian State

In the second part of his book, Perks sets forth his own vision for a Christian state, fashioned according to his interpretation of biblical law.

Perks begins by proposing that a cause of Coffey's problems might be that the magisterial reformers' theory of church/state institutional relationship did not define the separation between them sharply enough. As a result, while not right, those espousing "state neutrality" can perhaps be excused a little for observing that the theory proposed by the magisterial reformers had the institutional state interfering with the institutional church in a manner not consistent with biblical standards. While the reformers (such as Calvin and Johannes Althusius after him) could be said to have developed a nascent sphere-sovereignty,²⁶ it was perhaps too much to ask that they possess a reformed theory of government hatched fully formed, as it were, from the head of Zeus. While Perks advocates for the Christian church, broadly considered, to "be established in law, and therefore that the Christian faith should be defined confessionally in law,"²⁷ Calvin and the other reformers step over the biblically-established bounds for the state by having it provide for "public worship, i.e., of maintaining the Christian public religious cultus."²⁸ To the contrary, Perks points out that a robust maintenance of the sphere-sovereignty taught in Scripture results in the state punishing religious infractions that are also defined as crimes, i.e., those sins that also have civil penalties appended to them in the text.²⁹ Thus the state punishes criminals, which punishment then has a salutary effect on the life of the church and public worship by maintaining the social and civil order.³⁰

Singled out for particular criticism is the notion that the state is to enforce both tables of the law.³¹ Perks makes a good point when he states that if the Law comprises the whole duty of man, and the Decalogue is a summary of that whole duty, it follows that unless the state is to enforce the entirety of the Law, it should not be expected to enforce the entirety of the Decalogue. A power to enforce the entirety of the Decalogue would need to be a totalitarian power, particularly in the area of coveting.³² Not content with having the state interfere with the role of the church, Calvin would have it interfere with the family as well, providing for the poor, for schools, and hospitals, thus expanding "the jurisdiction of the civil government into a full-blown welfare state and more."³³ That John Cotton in the colonies adopted Calvin's misconceived confusion of the different spheres explains, if not excuses, Roger Williams' ill-considered debate with him.³⁴ Perks states that the solution to the problem presented by the formulation of the magisterial reformers is not adopting Coffey's position of neutrality, but in properly defining the biblical roles for societal spheres of jurisdiction.³⁵

Perks moves from a critique of the magisterial reformers to an analysis of what he believes to be the proper role of the state. To do so, he, like the Dooyeweerdians, begins with Kuyper's view of sphere sovereignty as first set forth in Kuyper's Stone Lectures³⁶ delivered at Princeton in 1898.³⁷ In this theory, all facets of life fall under God's will as expressed in His Word. Thus, there is no neutrality, just different spheres of jurisdiction or responsibility given to each institution established by Scripture: state, family, church. All that is not given to those institutions is left to the individual.³⁸ Therefore, while all of the creation is subservient to God's Word, not all of creation is subservient in the same way. The ground is thus cleared for Perks' minimalist approach to the state: after all, if the state is a sphere with a specific jurisdiction and authority, it follows that all areas not assigned to the state's jurisdiction may not be encroached upon by the state.³⁹ He further infers that a failure to keep all of the spheres in jurisdictional balance may result in a reductionist idolatry wherein all of reality is interpreted through one sphere's jurisdictional mandate, an extension of Romans 1:18-23.⁴⁰ Thus, the solution to the overweening state under the magisterial reformers is not religious neutrality as proposed by Coffey, but a proper balance of jurisdictional spheres under the sovereignty of God's will as expressed in His written Word.⁴¹ The "function of the State is the administration of public justice, the function of the institutional church is the ministry of God's word and maintenance of the Christian public religious culture"; and the function of the family is the raising of children, the provision of welfare and education for its members, and performing as the basic economic unit of society through tithes and legitimate taxes.⁴²

Perks moves to then draw his inference for the individual: the individual is a sphere of authority defined as those areas of life in which the other spheres have no biblical jurisdiction.⁴³ That this is a sphere of authority is seen by the fact that none of the spheres can create an individual's life for him; at some point, he must be responsible before God and society for his own actions. In fact, the individual's ability to govern himself according to God's law is a foundation of good government in the other spheres.⁴⁴

Does the breakdown of a sphere in a particular area justify another sphere "picking up the slack"? No, there is no evidence from the Scriptures that this is justified under God's will for society, although one may certainly understand how that might happen in a republic where the people demand it of their representatives because the people have fallen away from the Word. For example, the family does not provide for the welfare of its members, and the church does not move into its role of discipline and secondary provision for the needy; this is how government welfare programs get started. Similarly, if an individual fails to keep some facet of God's law, the church is to discipline him. The church's failure to discipline may not provide an excuse for the state to do so, and the church may also not invite the state to enforce its discipline unless the apostasy also is a crime, i.e., a breach of the public order,⁴⁵ as demonstrated by the existence of an accompanying penal sanction. None of the spheres derives its authority from another; each is responsible for discerning its own authority from God's Will as revealed in the Scripture.⁴⁶ Thus, to return to an earlier theme, the state is governed by a moral law superior to it. How are we to define that moral law if not by God's Written Word? A law not defined by such an objective standard becomes, according to Luther, "a broken net and no one would be restrained by it, but everyone made a hole in it wherever it pleased him to poke his snout, and followed his own opinions, interpreting and twisting Scripture any way he pleased."⁴⁷ Therefore, because of jurisdictional limits, the state may deplore the treatment of the poor and the church may preach against it, but the state is not permitted to step in and coercively redistribute wealth.⁴⁸ For the state to do so is implicit idolatry; placing its own derivative authority on a level with God's original authority.⁴⁹ While the magisterial Reformers' mistake was to confuse the spheres and attribute too much "deduced" authority to the state, "principled pluralists" such as Coffey deny that the state is under any religious law whatsoever.⁵⁰

Perks spends approximately six pages defending the concept of sphere sovereignty from the Scriptures. Since the book is a defense of the notion of a Christian State, he devotes a large part of the exposition to Romans 13:1-7, the locus classicus for discussions of the proper role of the state.⁵¹ His exegesis is one with which all who have any familiarity with Reformed writing on the subject will be familiar: the magistrate is the servant of God for the punishment of evil according to God's standard of righteousness, an assumption gleaned from the description of the magistrate as a "servant of God" who is "a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil." In context, of course, this phraseology recalls the warning from the end of Romans 12 that Christians are not to take personal vengeance because God has made provision for the structural execution of His wrath against those that offend His law.⁵²

I thank Mr. Perks for shedding a new perspective on the antecedent of "cause" and its contribution to the understanding of the phrase "attending continually upon this very thing" in Romans 13:6 in both this section and in Appendix A. Perks points out that the collecting of taxes in Romans 13 is restricted to the cause of keeping public order because the magistrate attends continually to that duty. Thus, instead of referring "cause" in 13:6 to the collection of taxes, he refers it to the maintenance of public order, pointing out along the way that both Jesus and Paul limit the sphere of Caesar's activity, and, therefore by extension, the collection of taxes to the support of that activity alone.⁵³ To bolster the limitation of the magistrate's job, Perks refers us to Blass-DeBrunner's A Greek Grammar of the New Testament which states that the phrase "this very thing" (auto touto) in Paul frequently means "just this (and nothing more)."⁵⁴ Thus armed with the limitation of the magistrate to executing God's wrath upon violations of the public justice, it remains for Perks to inform us of the proper standard for public justice under the New Covenant.

It is in this area that, understandably, Perks reaches some of his more controversial conclusions. After all, anyone that has been privy to the intramural debates among theonomists will understand that the easy answer to the question "by what standard" is "God's Law-Word." In presenting our public face to the "evangelifool" community, we understand that this answer is controversial enough. But even among theonomists, all recognize that the answer is not quite that easy. We who consider ourselves participants in the broader theonomist movement recognize that while we theoretically agree that the ultimate standard is biblical law as contained in the Old and New Testament, the hermeneutical "heavy lifting" is just beginning. While the old notion of the "moral-civil-ceremonial" law distinction may have become a little dog-eared and frayed around the edges with time, there is much work to be done in the area of exegeting, defining, developing and applying what is known as the "general equity" of the law. Therefore, while Perks' book is a generally pleasant read for those who already agree with him on the general issues of the supposed "religious neutrality" of the state and sphere-sovereignty, it is in the last few pages of the book that Perks helps us forward with some original thought on one of the thorny issues of the "general equity" debate: the state's punishment of idolatry.

His proposal actually begins with a modest enough example. Since all revelation is now given to us in Christ (Heb. 1:1-3) and there are no more prophets in the revelatory sense, the magistrate is no longer charged with the duty of punishing false prophets, it now being understood that since the office is abolished, false prophets in the Old Testament sense can no longer exist. 55 It is in the last chapter, however, dealing with the question of "the establishment question" (the interrelationship between the institutional state, the establishment of the Christian religion, and the institutional church) that Perks has the most to offer.

Since he has criticized Coffey for proposing that the state be non-confessional, Perks must, therefore, conclude that the state must be confessional in some sense, and, therefore, some confession must be established. Perks proposes that "a confessional definition of the Christian faith would be embodied in constitutional law and all individual churches whose own confessions came within the boundaries of the constitutional definition would be part of the established church."⁵⁶ After criticizing the present form of establishment in England as "Erastian".⁵⁷ Perks points out that in a Christian nation, a civil magistrate would have to be a member in good standing of a church that came confessionally within the pale of the established church, a qualification borne out in Deuteronomy 17:15, where a foreigner is forbidden to rule over Israel. To be a member of the established church for this purpose, however, requires that the Christian faith be confessionally defined in law.⁵⁸ Perks then makes a distinction between the Christian faith being established confessionally and being established denominationally. To this end, there would have to be a consensus as to the requirements of Christian orthodoxy for the purpose and church discipline rigorously enforced so that church membership would be comprised of only those so qualified. Finally, since in a representative government such as the American republic or the British parliamentary system, those invested with the franchise are, effectively, the state, suffrage would have to be based upon membership in good standing in a confessionally established church.

The most controversial part of Perks' proposal is his treatment of those falling outside of the confessionally established church. Those individuals and groups would be free to confess and practice their beliefs and activities both privately and publicly unless the practices "are against the law of the land and therefore constitute crimes, in which case the civil government would be duty-bound to take action to extirpate such practices and punish those involved in them."⁵⁹ Thus far, Perks is not controversial in what he proposes: everyone believes that the state should punish crime. Perks is in this case, however, setting us up for his proposal that blasphemy should not be a crime unless it is subversive of the public order. After all, if the maintenance of public order is the delimitation of the state's authority and jurisdiction, it follows that all matters not subversive of that order fall outside of the state's legitimate concern. It is not until the last few pages of Perk's conclusion that he fully unpacks the meaning of that notion: that blasphemy should not be punished by the state unless subversive of the public order, i.e., unless it rises to the level of a crime.⁶⁰ Once again taking his lead from Kuyper, blasphemy may constitute treason "when the intention is apparent contumaciously to affront this majesty of God as Supreme Ruler of the State."⁶¹. While the Bible has no penalty for treason per se, it maintains the death penalty for cursing God, and seducing other Israelites to apostatize and serve foreign gods; that is to say, for subverting the public order by attacking its foundation (Deut. 13:6-18; Lev. 24:10-16). ⁶²

Conclusion

Perks has written a book that contains something for everyone. For those of us just being introduced to the ideas that there is no neutrality, even for matters of state, and that the Bible might have something to say concerning contemporary statecraft, he has a great deal of material that speaks to that issue. For those of us to whom sphere-sovereignty is a foreign framework from within which to begin a biblical analysis of the relationships of the institutions within society (a description that takes in much of the evangelical mass), Perks does an admirable job of laying bare a theonomist rendition of that framework. Finally, for those few old hands, Perks helps us forward with a "Christian libertarian" vision of the minimalist state from a biblical perspective. The only criticism that can be lodged against the book is that it can be somewhat repetitious and disorganized, a criticism that I lay more to the charge of the article that Perks reviews than to Perks himself since his other books are models of concise writing. Aside from that, A Defence of The Christian State is a highly enjoyable book, and I recommend it highly.

John Fielding is a member of the National Reform Association Board of Directors and practices law in Berks County, Pennsylvania. He can be reached at fielding@talon.net.

Endnotes

1. Stephen C. Perks, A Defence Of The Christian State (Taunton, England: The Kuyper Foundation, 1998) (hereinafter "DCS"), 15, 194.

2. DCS, 15.

3. DCS, 196.

4. DCS, 199.

5. DCS, 16.

6. And one has only to look at some of my more constipated articles to recognize a kindred spirit!

7. I speak from experience; see my "Evangelicalism's New Model Army: A Review of Michael Horton's Beyond Culture Wars" (Journal of Christian Reconstruction, Vol. 14, No. 2 (Spring 1997)), 175-206.

8. Gordon J. Spykman, The Principled Pluralist Position (God and Politics: Four Views on the Reformation of Civil Government; Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1989), 90. For other examples of this view, see Herman Dooyeweerd, The Christian Idea of the State (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1978); Bob Goudzwaard, A Christian Political Option (Toronto, Ont., Canada: Wedge, 1972); James W. Skillen, ed., Confessing Christ and Doing Politics (Washington, D.C.: Association for Public Justice, 1982); A. Troost, The Christian Ethos (Bloemfontein, South Africa: Patmos, 1983); Paul Marshall, Dooyeweerd's Empirical Theory of Rights (The Legacy of Herman Dooyeweerd; Lanham, MD: University Press, 1985); James W. Skillen, The Scattered Voice: Christians At Odds in the Public Square (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990); H. Evan Runner, The Relation of the Bible to Learning (Fifth rev. ed.; Jordan Station, Ont., Canada: Paideia, 1982); H. Evan Runner, Scriptural Religion and Political Task (Toronto, Ont., Canada: Wedge, 1974).

9. See, e.g., Norman L. Geisler, "The Natural Right" (In Search of a National Morality: A Manifesto for Evangelicals and Catholics, William Bentley Ball, ed.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992).

10. According to the principled pluralists' own writings, "religious neutrality" is as nearly opposite to their claims as one can get. "Non-confessional" does fairly describe their position but not because of an insistence on religious neutrality. Whether their position amounts to an assertion of religious neutrality is a charge fairly leveled by their critics, in my opinion. Historically, theonomists and principled pluralists have at least partially the same heritage, as Perks' book later demonstrates.

11. DCS, 20.

12. DCS, 22.

13. DCS, 24.

14. Id.

15. DCS, 26.

16. DCS, 32, 195. Actually, what Coffey condemns sounds suspiciously like the Great Commission. Go figure.

17. DCS, 32.

18. DCS, 33.

19. DCS, 103.

20. DCS, 105.

21. DCS, 107ff.

22. DCS, 110ff.

23. DCS, 112-114.

24. DCS, 114.

25. DCS, 115.

26. Gordon J. Spykman, Sphere-Sovereignty in Calvin and the Calvinist Tradition (Exploring the Heritage of John Calvin, David E. Holwerda, ed.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1976), 163-208.

27. DCS, 130.

28. Id.

29. DCS, 133.

30. DCS, 131.

31. Id.

32. DCS, 132.

33. DCS, 133 (quoting from John Calvin, Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Isaiah (William Pringle, trans.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans), IV:40f.). Needless to say, our tradition of an overweening public school system has its genesis in the Puritans' uncritical acceptance of Calvin and the other reformers on this point.

34. DCS, 138-39.

35. DCS, 140-41.

36. Published as Lectures on Calvinism by Eerdmans and, as far as I know, still in print. Everyone who is interested in the cultural advance of the Reformed belief-system should have a copy.

37. As I understand it, the effect of the Dutch Neo-Calvinist Kuyper presenting these views to a group of Common Sense Realist theologians at Princeton was that of a Martian addressing them in Martian.

38. Actually, Kuyper's system is a little more complicated than that because he believed that schools, guilds and employer-employee arrangements, and certain other types of associations were entitled to the same respect. The theonomists have traditionally, however, thought in terms of three (perhaps four, if one counts the individual as one).

39. There would not, therefore, seem to be a need for a theory of human rights to be asserted over against the state in Perks' model. A theory of human rights assumes that humans are allowed to believe certain things and engage in certain activities by virtue of some innate sense of human dignity. The idea of human rights carries with it, however, the notion that human beings have a certain dignity that is, even when not autonomous, granted to them by God and seems to exist independently of restriction. Perks' model, on the other hand, does not seem to require that analysis: if the state (and other spheres, by implication) is limited to certain explicit activities, the individual is free to engage in any activities that do not transgress the jurisdiction of the other spheres. Thus, "rights" do not exist, only freedoms.

40. DCS, 143.

41. I hasten to add this because the Dooyeweerdians locate their Christian non-neutrality in a super-temporal allegiance of heart with God. As Morey explains: "First, the Word of God grips the heart giving Religious Directive. This Directive does not bring with it moral directions or rules. Having had the heart gripped by the Religious Directive of the Word, the scientist must look to the Law-structured situation within the creation. He must discover and apply those specific norms within the ethical function or modality of life which are relevant to the situation." Robert A. Morey, The Dooyeweerdian Concept of the Word of God (Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974), 6. Thus, God's Law in the Old Testament is seen as a product of ancient Israel performing this task in their time and place. Thus, "the 'Ten Commandments' and all such laws in the Bible 'are nothing more than concrete outworkings, positivations of this Directive within a particular in a particular period of history. None of them can be literally followed or applied today, for we live in a difference period of history in a different culture.'" Morey, quoting Understanding the Scriptures (DeGraaff and Seerveld, A.A.C.S., Canada, 1968), 35. Needless to say, theonomists and Dooyeweerdians differ greatly on the relevance of God's Written Law for today. For more on the distinction between God's Written Word and God's Word as the Directive, see Harry L. Downs, Power-word and Text-word in Recent Reformed Thought (Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1974).

42. DCS, 144-45.

43. DCS, 145.

44. DCS, 146-48. However, one must not thereby draw the conclusion that the individual is the foundation for the other spheres, as with Libertarians. The institutions are created by God and may not be reduced to individual group action. However, the individual's ability to exercise good self-government is the foundation for his proper functioning within those institutions, which, in turn, ensures that those institutions properly exercise their authority. Thus, for example, if a man cannot rule himself and his family, how shall he rule the family of God? (1 Tim. 3).

45. DCS, 149-50.

46. DCS, 151. Which is not to say that the church does not exercise a prophetic ministry with respect to all spheres, as George Gillespie pointed out to James VI of Scotland.

47. Martin Luther, "That These Words of Christ, 'This Is My Body,' etc., Still Stand Firm Against the Fanatics" (Luther's Works, American Edition, Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut T. Lehmann, eds.; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1961), 37:13-14.

48. DCS, 153. Boy, this must hurt an Englishman like Perks!

49. DCS, 154-55.

50. DCS, 155. Of course, as has already been discussed, Coffey is not a "principled pluralist" in the same sense as Gordon Spykman: Coffey believes that the state must be "neutral" with regard to all religious positions; Spykman would deny that the state is neutral but operates under the guidance of the Religious Directive which points it to the common creation structures to discern norms common to all confessions, not the Scriptures. The "cash value" is the same: one neutrally looks to a "natural law order" for a common morality, the other looks to "creation structures" under a non-neutral but non-specific directive.

51. Although, as Perks points out, Coffey amazingly manages to avoid discussing it at all.

52. Another reminder to us that Robert Stephanus' horse is not to be the supreme arbiter of the end of chapters.

53. DCS, 156-58, 180-88.

54. DCS, 158.

55. DCS, 159. Perks allows for the prophetic ministry of the Church as that which "forthtells" the revelation of Christ.

56. DCS, 164.

57. On the subject of Erastianism in England and Scotland, see generally, George Gillespie, Aaron's Rod Blossoming (1646; Harrisonburg, VA: Sprinkle, 1985). For a fascinating portrayal of a practical application, see the debate in the movie "Chariots of Fire" between Eric Liddell and the Olympic Committee of the United Kingdom. As Lord Carduggan grumped, "In my day, it was King first, and God second."

58. DCS, 166-67.

59. DCS, 169-70.

60. DCS, 176.

61. DCS, 176 (quoting Kuyper, Lectures on Calvinism, 103).

62. DCS, 176-78.

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