Small world. I graduated from Southern in 2000, and took church history (2 semesters) from Pettibone in 1998-1999. Sounds like things hadn’t changed too much during the five years between us!

I took Church History from Denni Pettibone at Southern Adventist University Fall 2004 & Winter 2005. Were you in the same class?

There are many tapes are on religion, and both testaments as well as philosophy and psychology of religious beliefs. Currently, I am listening to Early Middle Ages, one of the more neglected eras of history. Today, there is no excuse for anyone to be ignorant on any subject with such easy availability.

So…you’re absolutely right in saying that so many from other disciplines have contributed to teaching and broadening the understanding of church history (including those from theology)—each from their particular perspectives. Especially in this age of interdisciplinary inquiry, they ought to continue to do so. But we do need more specialists and lifelong pursuers of church history who live and breathe it. Don’t you think?

There is a reason why there are established disciplines and boundaries. When I taught at PUC, for example, I, as a trained church historian teaching in the Religion department, didn’t even think about teaching American history or Medieval history in the History department, though I’m sure I could easily have done it. Why? Because I respect the different disciplines.

So…I’m not sure about the method and approach being more important than content. Can an art historian really teach medical history on college level because he has good methodology & approach? Can I teach journalism because I enjoy writing, blog regularly, and worked as a reporter 15 years ago … and can offer some interesting methods of teaching? Could a chemist teach PE because she’s a good athlete? There are exceptional cases, but when it comes to college level teaching, shouldn’t we seek specialists?

(You can tell this subject is close to my heart…since teaching church history is what I do. =) )

I guess it depends on the kind of teachers you have in mind. More important than content (American Civil Rights?) is method and approach. Did your history teacher teach you how to think critically?

I for one believe this is should be the case: Christian history taught in our colleges and seminaries by professional historians. History taught by Adventist clergy (church historians?), tend to be approached with a providential/fulfillment of prophecy mindset. For starters, a humanities/music/art appreciation view of Christian history won’t hurt, I think..

And that our denomination has produced a Nathan Brown, a Julius Nam and a J.David Newman illustrates my point on this.

Of course, this “freedom in Christ” is not without its pitfalls. Mankind seems to forever be searching for certainty grounded in tradition and SDA’s through their own church history and writings of EGW reflect this tendency; where we eradicate one source of tradition, we are usually quick to erect another. where we are eager to dispense with one system of rules and barriers we are adept at creating new, equally works-oriented procedures and demands.

And naturally this spirit of innovation has led to lots of conflicts with one another as we try to be faithful to both the Spirit and the Letter of God’s Word (see Women’s Ordination).

So the result of this ahistorical orientation doesn’t always appear pleasant, but then again, neither is much of Christian history (See Inquisition; John Calvin’s Geneva). The urge to maintain consistency and orthodoxy on the one hand and to reform, to innovate, to learn, and to progress, on the other hand is a tension that is always with us.

Your memories of church history class in undergrad mirror my own. So closely in fact, i wonder if you were in my class. Where you? lol…

Part of this attitude, I think is due to the basic immaturity of college students at this age. I remember I had a very hard time intellectually trying to take it all in. Of course, the factors you mention so succinctly played a major role as well.

It wasn’t until graduate school/seminary (at a non-Adventist institution I might add) that I began to see the importance of some of these ideas. I began to see the importance especially of historical theology. Whether this had to do with my own personal development or the style of teaching/institution is something I’m trying to figure out. =) Probably a bit of both…

Julius, your ccoments: “Without recognizing the broad historical stream that every single doctrine of Adventism finds itself in, we have lived under the delusion that every Adventist teaching can be directly gleaned from Scripture without the help of Christian tradition.” encapsulate the theme of the article.
Not knowing of our Christian heritage, but much more of Adventist tradiion, we have robbed ourselves of appreciating the great work done by the many church fathers who spent most of their lives developing the doctrines we so casually accept today. If others are encouraged to study further, they will be greatly rewarded.

I agree with you, the other commenters, and Elaine that Christian history has been a neglected area of theological instruction in Adventist colleges. I can clearly testify to that, having taught at four different Adventist colleges in North America.

One key problem is that myth that Adventists have harbored that we have somehow dropped down from the apostolic era, or maybe from the Reformation era. Without recognizing the broad historical stream that every single doctrine of Adventism finds itself in, we have lived under the delusion that every Adventist teaching can be directly gleaned from Scripture without the help of Christian tradition. So, yes, we must do a better job of either gratefully or grudgingly acknowledging the historical influences that have shaped Adventism. I think Adventist historians beginning with Leroy Froom (though some wouldn’t call him historian, but merely an apologist) began to do that, and more is being done.

Which leads me to my 2nd point….

We have way too many theology majors going into biblical and systematic theology and too few into church history. The result: There’s very few of us to champion historical studies….hence not enough attention given to it in undergraduate programs. I think the Andrews Seminary is a somewhat of an exception to this, but one institution alone cannot reverse the trend. The bottom line is: We need more Adventists doing church history, historical theology, and history of all kinds. In most Adventist colleges, church history is taught not by church historians, but out of History departments by those would majored in secular history but has some interest in religious history. This results often in religion/theology majors never truly owning church history and viewing it as a “cognate” or “nice addition” to their theological training.

As you can tell, this is a topic that is dear to my heart. =)

The Religion Dept. may have upheld the importance of familiarizing future pastors with Christian history–but that’s a distant cry from actually teaching the to embrace that tradition as their own. Does the historicist interpretation of prophetic history embraced by Adventism lend itself to such an appropriation? The “Remnant Church’s” “us v. them” approach to the Roman Catholicism (for instance) colors most early Church fathers “apostates.” Every leading Adventist evangelist misuses the title “the Dark Ages” to refer to the entire Medieval era (allegedly because Europe was under the blasphemous reign of “the little horn”); how could this foster pride among Adventist youth in the accomplishments of Medieval Christianity? Finally, the Great Controversy reflects a “hidden church” historiography, which teaches that a purer Christianity was transmitted by such heretical groups as the Albigenses. Why then should Adventist pastors embrace the history of the mainstream Church as their own?

I look forward to the time when Adventist pastors do instruct their congregations in Christian heritage. But that time has not yet arrived; significant changes must first occur in the realm of pastoral formation.

I admit that talking about ambiguities isn’t the most inspiring thing for many, even most, people. Certainty is very important for many people and for a church’s mission.

The problem from my experience is that life seldom fits comfortably into clearly defined, irrefutable boxes and lists. I guess you can say I’m very certain about my uncertainty.

Wayne, where do you pastor?

Interesting that you mentioned Justo Gonzalez. I have a two-volume set by him on Church history and two volumes of a three volume set on Christian thought. What did you think of Gonzalez?

My point about The Great Controversy as the only historical treatment of Christianity is that it is the only “popular” source out there. I assume theology students at our SDA schools learn more. But if you look at our bookshelves at the ABC there isn’t much there. There’s some historical stuff on the Sabbath of course. But the Adventist take on Christian history is pretty truncated. I think Elaine’s point about assuming too much in the relm of Christian knowledge on the part of new converts is well taken. Most of us are pretty under-educated on the subject.

“Then again, are we ever truly “objective”? Especially on matters historical? What would a “thorough, rational and objective” look at church history look like? ”

Probably not. But there tends to be a lot of all-or-nothing thinking when it comes to religion in general and SDAism in particular. It would be helpful if our publications were to somehow reflect some of the ambiguities that abound in history and in the development of Christian doctrine. For example, in the GC Luther is sort of treated as this saintly figure but in many ways he wasn’t particularly saintly and his version of Protest was quite a bit different than what SDA’s assume today.

Glenn, I thought the term “propaganda” too strong. I realise that the Great Controversy does give a very definite “Adventist” perspective on Christian History; but to use the term propaganda seems to imply that EGW was somehow devious and covert in her writing. I do not believe that she ever intended it to be a “thorough” look at church history.

Then again, are we ever truly “objective”? Especially on matters historical? What would a “thorough, rational and objective” look at church history look like?

I wasn’t suggesting that George Knight’s book is a good source for church history. It may even be overly simplistic but I think that it provides a helpful rubric to understand Adventism, its theological/identity development, and why certain issues are emphasized over others.

The Great Controversy, if I remember correctly, presents a perspective on church history from the Reformation onwards and then moves to eschatology in its final chapters. I think some of Mrs. White’s comments on the Reformation reflect a Protestant interpretation of it. (I think a Catholic perspective would be different, and don’t know if a “thorough. rational, and objective look” is possible…but this is a different issue.)

With this said, yes, I think the Great Controversy presents church history as if it started at the Reformation. (Does “Acts of the Apostles” count as early church history?) Obviously, even if one takes these two books as a rudimentary account of church history, there’s a big problem if it is seen as the only source. It leaves out all the creeds, controversies, etc. and their signficance. (I think this was the point of Elaine’s comments.) However, the argument could be made that reading them introduces many people today to some church history as many Christians , at a popular level at least, do not even know what the Reformation was!

I think that the comment that the Great Controversy is the only source of church history in Adventism is a bit unfair. I took two semesters of church history at an Adventist college where we used a standard text–Justo Gonzalez, I believe. With this said, only theology and history majors were required to take this. Everyone else took a class called “Adventist Heritage” which was a course on denominational history. (Which supports what I was trying to say in the previous post–many Christians define their idenity soley in reference to their own denominatioanal distinctives/history and that this is a problem.)