Luther, Chemnitz,… Walther! (not Gerhard in Big 3)

[2020-09-04: added link below to later post on Mayes judgment; 2019-07-30 updated link to new CPH Gerhard book; 2017-05-31: added item #6 to Gerhard's weaknesses; updated August 14, 2015 in green text; July 29, 2015 – added red text]
I have previously highlighted (see also here) the following statement made by Franz Pieper, but I want to repeat it again because it is so striking in the face of many of today's theologians:

We believe we are not asserting too much when we say that after Luther and Chemnitz probably no teacher of our Church has given more vital witness of the doctrine of justification than Walther.  Walther had Luther as his teacher especially also in this doctrine, and gathered the luminous rays which the later teachers shed upon this doctrine into one beam of brilliant light.

— Franz Pieper (LuW 36-1890, pg 10)(German text)

Franz Pieper knew very well the teachings of John Gerhard, another great teacher of the Lutheran Church from the 17th century.  He quoted Gerhard over 125 times in his Christian Dogmatics books.  But Franz Pieper boldly sets Walther ahead of John Gerhard in this statement!  And Pieper knew exactly what he was doing.  Walther himself would never have set himself above Gerhard as he highly praised Gerhard's work, even concerning the Doctrine of Justification, even (somewhere) setting Gerhard just behind Luther and Chemnitz.  But Franz Pieper was no ordinary judge of Church History, for he could see that the "luminous rays" of the Gospel had not been so well gathered "into one beam of brilliant light" since the Reformation century than by ... C.F.W. Walther.

So why reassert this today?  Because it directly refutes what many modern theologians are attempting to do:

1) Repristination Press, Sacred Meditations, pg 9 (James Heiser?, as Nathaniel Biebert of WELS repeats):

“Gerhard is the third (Luther, Chemnitz, Gerhard) in that series of Lutheran theologians in which there is no fourth” 

Repristination Press would slam the door in Walther's face!  But Franz Pieper not only kept that door open, he proclaims to the face of Repristination Press that Walther is right behind Luther and Chemnitz, indeed implicitly ahead of Gerhard on the Doctrine of Justification.  Anyone who has read both Walther and Pieper would know that this certainly is not out of disregard for Gerhard!  Rather it reflects the beauty of the pure Gospel, the Gospel that Walther set back on its pedestal, reflected in the beautiful descriptive terminology of "Universal, Objective Justification".

and

2) Concordia Publishing House is following in these same footsteps in parts of its praise for John Gerhard.  Matthew Harrison joins those who would so praise Gerhard as to forget Walther and Franz Pieper:

“Gerhard’s Loci is the greatest doctrinal text in the entire history of Lutheranism."

What these moderns mean by their elevation of John Gerhard today is to obscure C.F.W. Walther.  They propose to know Lutheranism better than the father of the Missouri Synod, better than his successor Franz Pieper.  They purposely take the focus away from the many writings of C.F.W. Walther (including his Baieri Compendium, but also implicitly place Franz Pieper's Christian Dogmatics out of view.  They do not expose (Distinguendem Est) the weaknesses of John Gerhard who:

1. Disagreed with Luther's translation of Gen. 4:1b
2. Attempted to rationalize the doctrine of Election with the phrase intuitu fidei (in view of faith)
3. Was not as forceful in directly proclaiming the universality of God's justification 
4. "... some later Lutheran dogmaticians [e.g. Gerhard] differentiated, as to the object of faith, between Christ's merit as the thing that justifies ... and justification, or remission of sins, itself, presenting only Christ or Christ's merit and not the forgiveness of sins, or justification itself, as the object of faith." - De iustificatione, § 179 (ref. Christian Dogmatics Vol. 2, pgs 539-540
5. Deviated from Scripture and Confessions on teaching of Sunday (per Christliche Dogmatik v. 1, pg 637, n. 1570 #2, Baier-Walther III, 351-355)
6. Showed some confusion on the distinction of Antilegomena and Homologoumena (per Christliche Dogmatik v. 1, p. 406 & n. 1127; Christian Dogmatics v. 1, p. 336 & note 139)

On point #3, I am interested in the forthcoming English translation from CPH of Gerhard's Loci - On Justification in the Fall of 2018 [2019-07-30 updated link], to see Gerhard's strengths and weak areas of expression when compared to Luther, Chemnitz, Walther and Pieper. [2020-09-04: see this later post for sad judgment in this book by General Editor Prof. Mayes against Walther]

To those who continue to be blinded to the greatness of C.F.W. Walther in the Lutheran Church, and rather hold up John Gerhard ahead of him, they do an injustice to Gerhard.  In reality they do not properly honor him when they overlook, and maybe even follow, Gerhard's weaknesses.  The same holds true also in the case of Hermann Sasse today.

Yes, go ahead Repristination Press and CPH, heap up your praise of Gerhard, show how scholarly you are!  ... how "Lutheran" you are! ... how "theological" you are... higher than the heavens! ... so much higher than Walther and Pieper!  By this you distinguish Franz Pieper even more, you in essence betray yourself and proclaim

Franz Pieper, the Twentieth Century Luther!

... and the true Church Historian.  I will read of Gerhard's works because Walther and Pieper recommend him, certainly not because the moderns recommend him above Walther and Pieper.