The Current Epistemological Mayhem in Protestantism
A quote from Billy Abraham’s Crossing the Threshold of Divine Revelation. It’s a great book for an introduction to theological/religious epistemology.
Current efforts to weave together bits and pieces of scripture, tradition, reason, and experience are ad hoc measures to shore up the tottering edifice that Protestantism has become. By the twentieth century Protestantism could no longer follow its own trajectory and stick to sola scriptura; nor could it follow Roman Catholicism and adopt the epistemological dogmas that are now constitutive of the life of faith in that ecclesial tradition [i.e. Papal infallibility]. So modern Protestant theologians fell to bundling epistemic concepts together and rattling them around in their heads, like a gambler rattling around the dice in his hands in the hope that the numbers would come out just right on the next throw. The theological outcomes these elastic epistemic notions make possible are legion; they require a complex vision of ecclesiastical pluralism that is now threatening to disintegrate under pressure from within. Wandering from this epistemological pillar to that epistemological post, much of contemporary Protestantism is like a house swept clean of its resources. Changing metaphors, Protestantism has become like the penniless alcoholic; bereft of money but still addicted to the bottle, the alcoholic has nothing left but the bad smell of the empties piling up in the corner. Postmodernism offers a wobbly way forward beyond this grim state of affairs by adopting an ironic skepticism about epistemology and by reinstating this or that favored element of the faith as best it can. What remains within much of Protestantism is a network of ecclesiastical interest groups and renewal movements fighting it out for control of the tradition. It is time for a recovery of nerve in every direction. (Abraham, 103-4)
Abraham paints a bleak picture. If you want to see what he deems a “better way,” check out the next section of the book.
