JPK5: Koehler–dangerous path; Stöckhardt–”old paths”

      This concludes my protest from Part JPK1 (Table of Contents in Part JPK1) against today's "Wisconsin Synod" and its Pastor Peter M. Prange's blindness in following (the deposed) John Philipp Koehler. 

Wisconsin Synod!  You are on a "dangerous path" 
in following John Philipp Koehler! ==>>

To: Pastor Peter M. Prange:

      You, like J. P. Koehler, call for a "reinvigorated" science of exegesis.  Yet Prof. Armin Schuetze did not hide the following report concerning the 1905 meetings with the Ohio Synod on the Predestinarian Controversy (The Synodical Conference: Ecumenical Endeavor, p. 186-187, emphasis mine):

“Toward the end of the discussions, Dr. Hoenecke commented, 'Also by means of exegesis we will not arrive at agreement because our opponents from the very start differ with us in the analogy of faith'.”

Pastor Prange, your call for a "reinvigorated" exegesis is a direct contradiction of not only Franz Pieper and George Stoeckhardt, but also Dr. Adolf Hoenecke.  Hoenecke denied the path for Koehler's new approach against the "rusty thinking" of the Synodical Conference teachers. The men of the Old Synodical Conference clearly delineated the plain meaning of the Scripture passages on the Doctrine of Election of Grace.  Instead, you have clearly identified a distinct change in today's "Wisconsin Synod" from the old Wisconsin Synod, the Wisconsin Synod from above. You may call yourself "Wisconsin Synod", but you are not. This is analogous to today's LC-MS which likes to identify itself as the "Missouri Synod", but it is not.

Will the real Stoeckhardt please stand up?

      Those who would still follow Koehler's "exegetical clarifications" and yet claim Stoeckhardt for their causes, to them I apply a modified phrase of Franz Delitzch:

“You flatter yourselves that Stoeckhardt is your patron.”

It was Stoeckhardt who filed a formal protest against J. P. Koehler's misuse of "exegesis".

Stoeckhardt, in exegesis, second to...? 

The fact that Stoeckhardt's works are so obscure in today's LC-MS (CPH here, CTS-FW here) is only a sign of how far it has changed from the Old (German) Missouri Synod, not because Stoeckhardt is outdated.  And I would even question Prof. Joel L. Pless, after his glowing remarks on Stoeckhardt's exegesis (see Part JPK1), why does he not include any of Stoeckhardt's books in his "very short list", why has he not spearheaded an effort for NPH to publish and sell the languishing works of Stoeckhardt?……… (See the recently republished Stoeckhardt book Grace Upon Grace by Steadfast Press.)

…while NPH sells the book A Commentary on Galatians and Ephesians by J.P. Koehler, "one of the premier theologians" of the WELS?  Prof. Pless, it appears your praise of Stoeckhardt's exegesis… has fallen on deaf ears. (I had to laugh to learn that NPH still sells a Stoeckhardt book… but only in Spanish!)

Antidote to J. P. Koehler

<< One Benefit of John Philipp Koehler?

      I now wonder that Franz Pieper came to decide to write a "Dogmatics" series of books in part because of J. P. Koehler's agitation in the Synodical Conference against “dogmatism”.  I believe Pieper felt compelled by the great need, not only in his Missouri Synod but also in the Synodical Conference, to produce a clear work of Dogmatics to counter the confusion instigated by Koehler.  The result? ... his Christian Dogmatics!

Romans 12:6 – Objective Faith!

      Pieper refutes Koehler's misuse of the word "faith" (πίστις) as subjective faith in his poster verse, Romans 12:6 (Vol. 2, page 451; CDk 2, 540-541, footnote 1260):

Rom. 12:6
"Faith" is objective

“Luther takes πίστις (faith) in Rom. 12:6 in the objective sense: “Prophecy” must agree with the doctrine of faith. He translates: ‘Hat jemand Weissagung, so sei sie dem Glauben aehnlich’ and says in his Church Postil (St. L. XII:334; [Lenker v. 8, pg 27-28, #17-18]) that to agree with the faith means to agree with “the doctrine of Scripture,” and again (in his last sermon preached at Wittenberg, Jan. 17, 1546, St. L. XII:1169 ff., (p. 1175, #15; AE 51, p. 378) that it means to refrain from all human speculation, which [without God's Word] produces its own thoughts about God and matters divine.”

And of course, the 1932 Brief Statement clearly expresses this teaching in paragraph #2. Any Lutherans of today who subscribe to the Brief Statement and yet hold to the peculiar doctrines of J. P. Koehler are not being entirely honest with themselves. —  I am aware that George Stoeckhardt, in his exegesis of Rom. 12:6 (German p. 568, English translation p. 426:), considered that it was "very questionable whether πίστιν (faith) is used in the N.T. in this objective sense".  I consider this a weakness of Stoeckhardt but find that his firmness in the other areas of Objective or General Justification and Verbal Inspiration (as Dr. Pieper pointed out) overcame this weakness.  And Stoeckhardt never attempted to pit Exegetical Theology over Dogmatics for he too wrote many dogmatic articles and essays.  He wrote most beautifully about the doctrines of General Justification and even Walther's doctrine of Church and Ministry. Stoeckhardt's 1894 Central District essay outlined the doctrines as his "Missouri Synod" taught.  Stoeckhardt was a "Missourian". Koehler attempts to claim Stoeckhardt for his causes, but the fact remains, as Koehler reported (History, p. 212), that Stoeckhardt "filed a formal protest… in several letters" against Koehler's misuse of exegesis.  Unfortunately, but to a lesser degree than by the LC-MS, the Wisconsin Synod morphed into the new "Wisconsin Synod".  Perhaps the best indication of this change is proclaimed in the following statement in Wauwatosa Theology, vol. 1, p. 93 concerning (emphasis mine):

“Other changes were made gradually, no doubt to reflect the viewpoint that exegesis, not dogmatics, was to be the most important discipline. Today I would venture the guess that all members of our faculty and student body and all our synod pastors would agree that exegesis should be most important among the theological disciplines. Pray God that it will always stay that way.” — Martin O. Westerhaus, 1988

This change that placed "exegesis" over dogmatics was the intent of John Philipp Koehler – it was definitely not the intent of their supposed founder George Stoeckhardt! (1894 Central District) This change was clearly not the intent of Adolf Hoenecke when he disallowed exegesis over dogmatics as a means of resolving the dispute with American Lutherans who opposed the Synodical Conference. (Schuetze, p. 186-187)  

Franz Pieper — in the bull's eye for Wisconsin Synod

      Indeed, Leigh Jordahl, editor of the History, spoke for the new "Wisconsin Synod" (History, p. xvi, n. 37):

Franz Pieper (1852-1931) became Walther’s successor as the theologian of the Missouri Synod. The best introduction to his work is through his Christliche Dogmatik, translated and published under the title Christian Dogmatics (St. Louis, Concordia, 1950-1953). This is also the most thorough articulation of the theology of Lutheran orthodoxy produced in America. It [Pieper's theology] personifies the methodology which Koehler and the Wauwatosa theology attempted to transcend and transform.

My prayer to God for today's Wisconsin Synod is that it returns the field of dogmatics to its rightful place, that this field of theology not be ignored to the extent that it is placed under exegetical theology.  A good beginning would be to re-establish the field of Dogmatics, both Hoenecke's and Franz Pieper's to their rightful prominence for "Lutheran orthodoxy", i.e. the "old paths", to that of the old, true Synodical Conference.  

Dr. Robert Preus said it well in his essay "How is the Lutheran Church to Interpret and Use the Old and New Testaments?" for the 1973 Reformation Lectures at Bethany Lutheran College (p. 8): 

"This position, that exegesis yields and must yield doctrine… is most important for us to be aware of today, if we are to understand how we as Lutherans ought to interpret and apply the Scriptures. …certain exegetes of the past depreciated dogmatics because they have separated doctrine from exegesis [e.g. J. P. Koehler], but proponents of the historical critical method of exegesis today have virtually outlawed the very concept of dogma in the sense of pure doctrine. Thus exegesis is given a purely historical function and purpose."

While Preus was defending against the "Historical Critical Method", yet the shoe fits also for Prof. J. P. Koehler. And here would be a good starting point in the study of the Lutheran Book of Concord:

But since in this controversy the chief topic of Christian doctrine is treated, which, understood aright, illumines and amplifies the honor of Christ [which is of especial service for the clear, correct understanding of the entire Holy Scriptures, and alone shows the way to the unspeakable treasure and right knowledge of Christ, and alone opens the door to the entire Bible], and brings necessary and most abundant consolation to devout consciences…

      No one, no one, no one proclaimed the pure Gospel in the Twentieth Century more purely and forcefully than... Franz Pieper.  It will be Franz Pieper who will be the judge of who is the greatest exegete of modern times.  That man is... George Stoeckhardt!... who protested against the misuse of "exegesis" by John Philipp Koehler (History, p. 212), who deferred away from an exegetical discussion to a discussion of the Lutheran Confessions in the 1906 Intersynodical Ft. Wayne meeting (History, p. 247).

John Tietjen      —       Richard Koenig 

    If any of the supporters of J. P. Koehler would now say that I have been too harsh with him, that he taught Verbal Inspiration, Justification, Conversion and Election of Grace. I will not deny that I found some evidence for all of these. But in practically all cases, what he gives with one hand he takes away with the other, he leaves some doubt, especially with his ubiquitous charges of "intellectualism", "legalism", "dogmatism", "polemicism", "mechanical method", repetition, "parroting", "materialism", "formalism", "fossilized", "sectarianism", etc. As confirmation of this, Concordia Seminary President John Tietjen, in his Fact Finding or Fault Finding? pamphlet p. 10,  relied on Koehler for his faculty's aberrations on Scripture interpretation. And the editor of the liberal Lutheran Forum, Richard Koenig, in the November 1972 issue (p. 20), quoted Koehler's harsh remarks against the Missouri Synod and Pieper's scriptural theology. Koenig was a vocal sympathizer of the "Walkout". Does the Wisconsin Synod of today really want to follow the errors of also Tietjen and Koenig?

I had to endure much to read from Koehler, and especially from his followers, much talk about the "Life" part of their "Faith-Life" slogan, about the so-called "living faith".  They left the objective Faith… behind.  They left my faith… gasping for a breath of fresh air!  — But even if this were discovered, I would turn this around and declare that Koehler received this from those who went before him, essentially from the legacy of those he came to fight against – the Fathers and True Teachers of the Old Synodical Conference!

George Stoeckhardt

Greatest Exegete of Modern Times

Jeremiah 6:16 – Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.