Background High Scholasticism in
Western Christianity aimed at an exhaustive treatment of theology, supplementing revelation by the deductions of reason.
Aristotle furnished the rules according to which it proceeded, and after a while he became the authority for both the source and process of theology. He was deeply influenced by two tutors,
Bartholomaeus Arnoldi von Usingen and Jodocus Trutfetter, who taught him to be suspicious of even the greatest thinkers, Philosophy proved to be unsatisfying, offering assurance about the use of
reason, but none about the importance, for Luther, of loving God. Reason could not lead men to God, he felt, and he developed a love-hate relationship with Aristotle over the latter's emphasis on reason.It is not merely incorrect to say that without Aristotle no man can become a theologian; on the contrary, we must say: he is no theologian who does not become one without Aristotle Martin Luther held that it was "not at all in conformity with the New Testament to write books about Christian doctrine." He noted that before the Apostles wrote books, they "previously preached to and converted the people with the physical voice, which was also their real apostolic and New Testament work." To Luther, it was necessary to write books to counter all the false teachers and errors of the present day, but writing books on Christian teaching came at a price. "But since it became necessary to write books, there is already a great loss, and there is uncertainty as to what is meant." Martin Luther taught preaching and lectured upon the
books of the Bible in an exegetical manner. To Luther, St. Paul was the greatest of all
systematic theologians, and his
Epistle to the Romans was the greatest
dogmatics textbook of all time.
Loci method Beginning of the loci method In contrast,
Philipp Melanchthon scarcely began to lecture on Romans before he decided to formulate and arrange the definitions of the common theological terms of the epistle in his
Loci Communes.
Flourishing of the loci method Martin Chemnitz,
Mathias Haffenreffer, and
Leonhard Hutter simply expanded upon Melanchthon's
Loci Communes. With Chemnitz, however, a biblical method prevailed. At Melanchthon's suggestion he undertook a course of self-study. He began by carefully working through the Bible in the original languages while also answering questions that had previously puzzled him. When he felt ready to move on, he turned his attention to reading through the early theologians of the church slowly and carefully. Then he turned to current theological concerns and once again read painstakingly while making copious notes. His tendency was to constantly support his arguments with what is now known as
biblical theology. He understood biblical revelation to be progressive—building from the earlier books to the later ones—and examined his supporting texts in their literary contexts and historical settings.
Origin of the analytic method The philosophical school of
neo-Aristotelianism began among Roman Catholics, for example, the universities
Padua and
Coimbra. However, it spread to Germany by the late 16th century, resulting in a distinctly Protestant system of
metaphysics associated with
humanism. This
scholastic system of metaphysics held that
abstract concepts could explain the world in clear, distinct terms. This influenced the character of the
scientific method.
Jacopo Zabarella, a
natural philosopher from Padua, taught that one could begin with a goal in mind and then explain ways to reach the goal.
Flourishing of the analytic and synthetic methods After the time of
Johann Gerhard, Lutherans lost their attitude that philosophy was antagonistic to theology. Instead, Lutheran dogmaticians used
syllogistic arguments and the philosophical terms common in the neo-
Aristotelianism of the time to make fine distinctions and enhance the precision of their theological method. Scholastic Lutheran theologians engaged in a twofold task. First, they collected texts, arranged them, supported them with arguments, and gave rebuttals based on the theologians before them. Second, they completed their process by going back to the pre-Reformation scholastics in order to gather additional material which they assumed the Reformation also accepted. Even though the Lutheran scholastic theologians added their own criticism to the pre-Reformation scholastics, they still had an important influence. Mainly, this practice served to separate their theology from direct interaction with Scripture. Their scholastic method was intended to serve the purpose of their theology. Some dogmaticians preferred to use the
synthetic method, while others used the
analytic method, but all of them allowed Scripture to determine the
form and content of their statements.
Abuse of the methods Some Lutheran scholastic theologians, for example,
Johann Gerhard, used exegetical theology along with Lutheran scholasticism. However, in Calov, even his exegesis is dominated by his use of the analytic method With
Johann Friedrich König and his student
Johannes Andreas Quenstedt, scholastic Lutheran theology reached its zenith. However the 20th century Lutheran scholar
Robert Preus was of the opinion that König went overboard with the scholastic method by overloading his small book,
Theologia Positiva Acroamatica with Aristotelian distinctions. He noted that the scholastic method was inherently loaded with pitfalls. In particular, dogmaticians sometimes established
cause and effect relationships without suitable links. When dogmaticians forced
mysteries of the faith to fit into strict cause and effect relationships, they created "serious inconsistencies". In addition, sometimes they drew unneeded or baseless conclusions from the writings of their opponents, which not only was unproductive, but also harmed their own cause more than that of their rivals. Later orthodox dogmaticians tended to have an enormous number of artificial distinctions.
Merits of the methods On the other hand, the Lutheran scholastic method, although often tedious and complicated, managed to largely avoid vagueness and the fallacy of
equivocation. As a result, their writings are understandable and prone to misrepresentation only by those entirely opposed to their theology. The use of scholastic philosophy also made Lutheran orthodoxy more intellectually rigorous. Theological questions could be resolved in a clean cut, even scientific, manner. The use of philosophy gave orthodox Lutheran theologians better tools to pass on their tradition than were otherwise available. It is also worth noting that it was only after neo-Aristotelian philosophical methods were ended that orthodox Lutheranism came to be criticized as austere, non-Christian formalism. ==Distinction between scholastic theology and method==