Justification Theory Again

Douglas Campbell responded briefly to my brief discussion of his critique of “justification” theory. In a fit of joie de guerre, I respond briefly.

Campbell rebuts what he considers a “weak” argument in my post, namely, the claim that his decision to set out justification theory systematically and propositionally leaves him vulnerable to straw-manning. I shot myself in the foot, Campbell says, and then complained that he can’t walk.

Except he’s not responding to my argument. He assumes – wrongly – that I criticize him so as to persuade readers that Campbell’s “arguments and conclusions can be safely ignored.” Hardly. I didn’t say or imply any such thing in my post. 

His more substantive refutation is to cite the many pages of endnotes and citations. But I didn’t say he hadn’t documented the “presence” of justification theory. I agreed that Protestant soteriology has been infected with individualism and contractualism. But the fact that “Justification Theory” is “present” in this or that writer doesn’t mean that those writers would state their theory of justification in the terms he does – which was my complaint about his analysis. Even if one can gather quotations from Calvin and Luther to demonstrate that justification theory is present in both, that doesn’t mean the theory plays the same role in Calvin that it does in Luther. 

In any case, I thought my criticism rather friendly; Campbell has a case to make, and he could make it much stronger by taking a less systematic-propositional approach. 

Campbell’s response ignores the rest of my criticisms of his book: that he unwarrantedly collapses “salvation” into justification; that his treatment of justification theory ignores “transformational” elements in classic Protestant soteriology; that he lodges charges of “incoherence” when there is simply complexity. I don’t doubt that he has responses to those criticisms, but he doesn’t offer any. 

Campbell doesn’t know or care, I’m sure, but I have been critical of classic Protestant treatments of justification, and my conclusions overlap at important points with Campbell’s. See this, for instance.

What do I know, though, being no more than a conservative Protestant blogger with bad aim?