The Defense of Rationalism

What prompted the early church fathers to consider Christianity as a continuation of the events and promises of the Old Testament in the earliest decades after Christ’s ascension? To what extent did classical philosophy influence the development of Christian doctrine? Where did modern Christian doctrine come from and who decided what it was? Do you know the answers to these questions? The answers to these questions form some of the most concrete bases of the Christian faith; they represent the development of a tradition that has largely stayed in tact for over two thousand years and, forming the presuppositional basis of modern Christian thought, they infiltrate the minds of Christians on a daily basis. Being conscious of one’s tradition is crucial to a holistic understanding of one’s theological understanding of the world; tradition consciousness answers questions that ask “why are things the way they are?” At the same time, however, tradition can serve to stifle creative thought and stymie legitimate progress. What role should a self conscious conception of tradition play?

The intellectual concept of “tradition” has been a hot topic of discussion among academics. Foremost among the tradition scholars is Jaroslav Pelikan, chiefly a historian of the development of Christian doctrine. In his work, The Vindication of Tradition, Pelikan argues that tradition has played an important formative role in Western society; his main point is to evaluate not only the importance of tradition in society but its incredible prevalence (conscious or unconscious) throughout a wide variety of communities and ideologies. Tradition is both widely appealed to as a source of legitimacy or authority and attacked as a source of backwardness and unprogressive thought. Here lies the most significant contribution of Pelikan’s work: “Tradition is the living faith of the dead, traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. And…it is traditionalism that gives tradition such a bad name.” Pelikan’s key distinction between tradition and traditionalism clearly illustrates the importance of tradition as a source of heritage and knowledge and the dangerous potential uses of tradition as an oppressive maintainer of the status quo.

In this vein, the pursuit of tradition consciousness is vital to a holistic personal understanding of thought and doctrine for the useful ends of personal edification and knowledge of the unity of believers. At the same time, tradition consciousness is notorious for breeding pride, arrogance, and a resulting social dissonance. It is also true that knowledge of tradition can lead to an obsession with maintaining tradition rather than using that knowledge to unify and understand common origins. In this case, tradition can be used as a weapon to ostracize those who are different or hold different beliefs to be more crucial than others. With such potential for misuse, it is important that Christians approach tradition consciousness with a sense of humility and without an ideological agenda just as it is important to know tradition as a source of understanding.

In the end, tradition is not a weapon nor should it be a source of pride and arrogance. It is a living source of vital understanding. Tradition is a common heritage; a powerful unifying force among believers that is representative of our common inheritance in Christ. And, above all, tradition is a vital source of answers to the most pressing “whys” of our faith