Introduction
In studying the differences and the similarities between the beliefs of the early members of what came to be known as the Church of the Nazarene and those of what was labeled as the Fundamentalist movement of that same time period, one may come to recognize that while both groups were in agreement on many issues, perhaps even more similar than dissimilar, there were a number of issues, as evidenced in the writings of the early Nazarenes, on which the two groups differed drastically. Among these issues are seen six in particular that stand out among all the others and perhaps have caused the greatest amount of contention between the two groups.
Dr. Shelby Corlett listed five of these six issues in his April 1935 article titled “Nazarenes and the Fundamentalists” in the Herald of Holiness magazine. The first five to be addressed here are in the following issues: The “spirit” of Fundamentalism, verbal inspiration versus plenary inspiration of the Bible, the issue of eternal security, the influence of radical Calvinistic Pre-millennial positions, and the allowance made for “sin in the flesh” versus entire sanctification.[1] These five are the list that Corlett provides in regard to the major areas in which the early Nazarenes and the Fundamentalists differed. A sixth element may be added to this list for consideration, that being the issue of women in ministry.
The Spirit of Fundamentalism
While the Church of the Nazarene is not traditionally a part of the Fundamentalist movement but rather the Holiness movement, it still came into contact with and was strongly influenced by the spirit of the time in which it was conceived where the broad scope of Evangelicalism leaned towards Fundamentalism and the defense of the faith. The Nazarene church held in common many of the beliefs of those within the Fundamentalist movement, however, the church also recognized in general that what had become the Fundamentalist movement was a reaction to the modernism that was prevalent at the time.
One may see how the Fundamentalist movement came to have some significant influence over the Church of the Nazarene by reading the early literature of the church, especially the Herald of Holiness magazine during the time in which B.F. Haynes served as general editor for the publication.[10] Starting in 1913 up until the early 1920s, a number of articles ran that seemed to be in line at least in part with Fundamentalism, especially in the defense of the inerrancy of the Scriptures and in the rejection of modernism.[11] However, Haynes himself constantly criticized other elements that came to be associated with Fundamentalism, such as their rejection of the second blessing and other Calvinistic tendencies.[12] However, by the 1920s, growing support for Fundamentalism is evident, as the magazine began publishing more frequently articles which tended to use “hypostatic” language in regard to the Bible and which also insisted on the scientific accuracy of the Bible while at the same time recognizing that the Bible was not a science book.[13] Between 1923 and 1928 both the Herald of Holiness and the Preacher’s Magazine were constantly publishing articles with outright Fundamentalist messages.[14] J.B. Chapman had become the editor of both publications during this time and was a key contributor to this “Fundamentalist leavening” which began to appear.[15] He had been growing significantly in popularity within the Church, showing how the general church had begun to fall more into the Fundamentalist camp at this time, and was elected as a General Superintendent in 1928.[16]
So great was the alliance of the church with the Fundamentalist movement during this time period that at the 1928 General Superintendent Address to the Assembly, it was spoken:
Every man in this body is a fundamentalist… We believe the Bible and accept it as being the revealed Word of God, immutable, unchangeable, infallible and sufficient for every human need. A modernist would be very lonesome in this General Assembly… We stand for the Bible; we stand for the whole Bible, an immutable Bible.[17]
The church at large considered itself to be Fundamentalist, however, what was meant by this is debatable in that while the church at the time generally stood for the inerrancy of the Bible and the rejection of modernism, the church still differed from most Fundamentalists by holding to the Wesleyan belief in entire sanctification and standing against Calvinism.[18]
This Fundamentalist influence can further be seen in the change made in the wording of the Manual in the Article of Belief on Scripture. In 1928, the assembly voted without debate to add the word “inerrant” to the Article.[19] The Article now read:
We believe in the plenary inspiration of the Holy Scriptures by which we understand the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments, given by divine inspiration, inerrantly revealing the will of God concerning us in all things necessary to our salvation; so that whatever is not contained therein is not to be enjoined as an article of faith.[20]
However, it appears to have been the influence of H. Orton Wiley which caused the words “plenary inspiration” of the Bible to be used instead of “verbal inspiration.”[21] Wiley took over as editor of the Herald of Holiness upon Chapman’s election as General Superintendent.[22] He held this position from 1928 to 1936, during which time no more articles were published which spoke against modernism and leaned towards what seemed to be an idolatry of Biblicism.[23]
It was in this context that H. Orton Wiley began to emerge as a key influencer in the church who desired to help keep the Fundamentalist influence on the church under control and to remind the church of its Wesleyan roots. Although A.M. Hills had already begun writing his own systematic theology for the Nazarene church at the suggestion of his students,[24] H. Orton Wiley was commissioned in 1919 to write his own systematic theology to be officially used in pastoral education across the denomination.[25] At the time, he was president of Northwest Nazarene College, while Hills was president at Pasadena.[26] The choosing of Wiley over someone like Hills shows how while many within the church saw themselves as Fundamentalists (even within the ranks of the Generals), there was still significant leadership that felt uneasy aligning themselves completely with them. While Hills was not completely in line with Fundamentalist thinking, especially in his belief in postmillennialism,[27] he was still apparently too much of a Fundamentalist to write the church’s official theology.[28] [29] This is evidenced when he joined with Chapman in endorsing the Nazarene church’s first real case against modernism in a book by Basil Miller, published in 1925 by Nazarene Publishing House, titled Cunningly Devised Fables: Modernism Exposed and Refuted.[30] With Wiley’s Theology added to the course of study for ministers one can see an attempt by church leadership to bring the people back from Fundamentalism. Paul Bassett writes, “It remained to H. Orton Wiley both to offer a genuine Wesleyan alternative to Fundamentalism and modernism and to place the official theology of the Church of the Nazarene, if not the grass roots, back on truly orthodox turf.”[31]
Verbal versus Plenary Inspiration of the Bible
Wiley went on to say that it was not just the Bible which had at times been deified throughout history, but also the Church and Reason. Wiley believed in the importance of all three, but held that at times people had used them to replace Christ himself. The modernists had deified Reason, while the Fundamentalists had deified the Bible.[34] [35] Wiley also wrote that the two warring positions on the inspiration of the Bible by the Modernists and Fundamentalists both made inadequate assumptions.[36] He believed there to be a middle ground between the two camps. The Scriptures came into being by the will of both God and man, not just by man’s intuition as the modernists tended to believe, and not just by God’s dictation as the Fundamentalists tended to believe.[37] Wiley firmly held to plenary inspiration. He wrote, “By plenary inspiration, we mean that the whole and every part is divinely inspired. This does not necessarily presuppose the mechanical theory of inspiration, as some contend, or any particular method, only that the results of that inspiration give us the Holy Scriptures as the final and authoritative rule of faith in the Church.”[38] Many, however, within the church wished to see a greater alliance with the Fundamentalists. This was mainly in regard to the understanding of the Scriptures. On some other issues, such as the issue of entire sanctification, almost all early Nazarenes disagreed with the majority Fundamentalist stance which contradicted the idea of entire sanctification.
Issue of Eternal Security
Wiley states that their belief is in that of positional holiness where “The believer is holy in his ‘standing’ but not in his ‘state.’ Holiness is thus a matter of imputation instead of impartation.”[48] Wiley says that the idea that someone may experience an actual cleansing from all sin goes against the principles that this group teaches. He writes, “Actual cleansing from all sin is rejected as being out of harmony with their general principles. The ‘standing’ is eternal, and […] logically issues in the so-called doctrine of ‘eternal security.’”[49] In this way, one may see how the early Nazarenes stood in contrast to those within the Fundamentalist movement who tended towards Calvinistic understandings of salvation and who were in wide support of the Keswick Conferences because of their active stance against modernism. Nazarenes were different from Fundamentalists because Nazarenes were Wesleyan rather than Calvinist. They believed that one could be completely cleansed of all sin in this life, so that holiness was imparted rather imputed. If holiness is an impartation within the individual rather than eternally imputed position, then doctrine of eternal security has little bearing because eternal security rests solely on a positional relationship and does not adequately fit into a Wesleyan understanding of salvation or of holiness.
Even those within the Nazarene church who tended to lean towards Fundamentalism, did not fully embrace much of the Calvinism that was also associated with Fundamentalism. Bud Robinson is an example. Robinson spoke of his thoughts on the issue of eternal security, saying, “Beloved, don't you forget that when the eternal security man is telling you that nothing can separate you from God, that Old Bud said if your religion won't keep you out of sin in this world, it will not keep you out of hell in the world to come.”[50] One can see how the issue of eternal security is linked to the disagreement among Nazarenes and Fundamentalists over whether one could be freed from sin in this life or not. The defining belief of the Nazarene Church was in entire sanctification. Those who held to belief in eternal security often allowed for people to continue living in sin while believing that God would still let them into heaven anyway simply because they had prayed a prayer of salvation. Robinson continues, “There is nothing can put you in heaven but holiness. And as far as I have been able to see, the eternal security man takes no stock in holiness. Ridicule and scorn are his complete stock. What a pity!”[51] This shows a consistency among Nazarenes in the belief that only those who had been made holy by the cleansing from sin by the work of God would be able to enter into heaven. Robinson’s words also hearken back the issue of the general attitude and spirit of the Fundamentalist movement, which was an attitude of defense. Robinson recognizes here that those who have disagreed with the Nazarenes in this regard have done so defensively and by means of scorn and ridicule.
Radical Calvinistic Pre-millennial Positions
In 1919, the year he was commissioned to write the official theology of the Church, H. Orton Wiley asked Olive Winchester to serve at NNC as “professor of biblical literature, academic dean, and vice-president.”[57] Matthew Price writes that “She rejected the fundamentalist notion of pre-millenialism”[58] and that she saw how faith and science could work together without reacting out of fear towards modernism.[59] In this move, Wiley showed how he was in line with the teachings of the earliest Nazarenes who also rejected pre-millennialism, but who also believed that women ought to be able to serve in positions of leadership. Wiley also showed in this act that he had no need to fear the science of modernism even if he did not agree every modernist position. Also in keeping with tradition, Winchester “held to the instantaneousness of entire sanctification.”[60]
In regard the millennium, the Nazarene church never advocated for one position over another, but allowed for people to form their own opinions on such matters contended as minor debatable issues.[61] In fact, the Manual of the Church contained the following footnote in the article of faith on “The Second Coming of Christ” from 1915-1923:
We do not, however, regard the numerous theories that gather around this Bible Doctrine as essential to salvation, and so we concede full liberty of belief among the members of the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene.[62]
The church had always considered itself neutral on this issue, but it was a postmillennial perspective that was the driving force behind the mission of the earliest Nazarenes. A dispensationalist and escapist attitude which the Fundamentalists later brought into the church was not at all present.[63] The entrance of pre-millennial dispensationalism was linked with the era between the world wars in which many people, especially in the Midwest, began to lose hope that Christ’s kingdom could ever be established on earth without Christ first physically returning to reign.[64] People began to become more disillusioned with the world in general and with the establishment in particular, which led to a rise in suspicion against science and educational institutions.[65] The suspicion in regard to science and pre-millennial leanings was paired with the Fundamentalist tendency towards neo-Calvinism and verbal inerrancy of Scripture.[66] People believed that Christ’s return was imminent and that it was foolish to work towards the establishment of the millennial kingdom until he returned.[67]
“Sin in the Flesh”
Wiley also quotes from Chapman who understands the distinction between purity and maturity which people tended to have difficulty understanding. Chapman says, “Purity may be found in the earliest moments after the soul finds pardon and peace with God. But maturity involves time and growth and trial and development.”[69] While the purity received in entire sanctification is understood as instantaneously given, there is still growth overtime as one becomes more mature as a Christian.[70] The Church of the Nazarene as a whole refused to stand down on its belief in entire sanctification even in the light of the Fundamentalist leavening at the time. Even the Fundamentalist Nazarenes held to this belief. While some Fundamentalist Nazarenes misunderstood it and began preaching perfectionism,[71] many still held on to the belief of the church, such as Bud Robinson, who wrote, “To teach that a man could not sin if he wanted to is unscriptural and unreasonable, for we all know that if a person wants to sin, he can sin. But it is scriptural and reasonable to teach that a man can have so much of the grace of God in his heart that he has no desire to sin.”[72] This perspective differed from the Fundamentalists who believed that one could only attain this kind of perfection upon death and entrance into heaven. This belief that one could never be truly holy in this life is probably the most important difference between the two groups and is key to understanding the other differences.
Women in Ministry
While women were always accepted into ministry early on in the church’s history, a change took place over time where one is able to chart a significant decrease of women in ministry in the Nazarene Church. It has been argued that the reason for this decline was due to the influx of people from a more fundamentalist standpoint entering into the Nazarene church over time.[75] These people over time came to influence the church at least in part with their projections of a more literalist hermeneutic when it came to the Scriptures and what Paul had to say about women in the church.[76]
While the Fundamentalist leavening began to take its toll on the number of women entering into the ministry and the number of churches who accepted women as pastors, the denomination overall held strongly to the belief that women had the right to preach. Four times, between the years 1922 and 1943,[77] did individuals within the general assembly attempt to point out a conflict with the church’s position and the position of Paul in the New Testament, and “[e]ach time, the official answer declared that the calling of the Spirit is not limited by gender or race and that the historical position of ordaining women is faithful to the gospel.”[78] According to Stan Ingersol, the intentions of P.F. Bresee when he started the Church in Los Angeles were “that women's right to preach and pursue ordination was sufficiently safeguarded so long as apostolicity was the hallmark of the church's ministry.”[79] Even J.B. Chapman, who at times strongly leaned toward Fundamentalism, always believed that women should be allowed the right to preach. He wrote, “The fact is that God calls men and women to preach the gospel, and when He does so call them, they should gladly obey Him and members of the church and of the ministry should encourage and help them in the fulfillment of their task.”[80] This support for women in ministry was a very important difference between the early Nazarenes and the more mainline evangelical fundamentalist groups. Ingersol again writes, “The inclusion of women was not simply an add-on to traditional notions of Christian ministry but represented an altogether radically different doctrine of ministry held by the more progressive Holiness churches.”[81]
Conclusion
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[1] Dr. Shelby Corlett. “Nazarenes and the Fundamentalists,” Herald of Holiness, (April 1935).
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Paul Merritt Bassett. The Fundamentalist Leavening of the Holiness Movement, 1914-1940. The Church of the Nazarene: A Case Study. The International Church of the Nazarene Website. <http://www.nazarene.org>.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Ibid
[13] Ibid.
[14] Ibid.
[15] Ibid.
[16] Ibid.
[17] Ibid.
[18] Ibid.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Ibid.
[21] Ibid.
[22] Ibid.
[23] Ibid.
[24] Ibid.
[25] Ibid.
[26] Ibid.
[27] Ibid.
[28] Ibid.
[29] Paul Bassett writes:
“To be sure, Hills is outside the camp of the Fundamentalists, generally speaking, with respect to the millennium, for most of them were pre-millennialists and he was unabashedly post-millennial, and he admits that ‘we no longer have an absolutely inerrant Bible.’ But his mode of argument, ‘proofs’ of inspiration and authority, and theological method all mark him off as belonging among them.”
[30] Ibid.
[31] Ibid.
[32] H. Orton Wiley. Christian Theology. Nazarene Publishing House, Kansas City, Missouri, 1940, ch. 6.
[33] Ibid.
[34] Ibid.
[35] Wiley argues that it was the Church that had been elevated during the Roman Catholic era.
[36] Wiley., ch. 7.
[37] Ibid.
[38] Ibid.
[39] Wiley., ch. 29.
[40] Ibid.
[41] Ibid.
[42] Ibid.
[43] Ibid.
[44] Ibid.
[45] Ibid.
[46] Ibid.
[47] Ibid.
[48] Ibid.
[49] Ibid.
[50] Bud Robinson. Religion, Philosophy, and Fun. Beacon Hill Press, Kansas City, Missouri, 1942.
[51] Ibid.
[52] Dr. Mark Quanstrom. A Century of Holiness Theology. Nazarene Publishing House, Kansas City, Missouri, 2004.
[53] Timothy L. Smith, Ph.D. Called Unto Holiness. The Story of the Nazarenes: The Formative Years. Nazarene Publishing House, Kansas City, Missouri, 1962.
[54] Ibid.
[55] Timothy L. Smith, Ph.D. Nazarenes And the Wesleyan Mission: Can We Learn from Our History? Beacon Hill Press of Kansas City, Kansas City, Missouri, 1979.
[56] Smith. Called Unto Holiness. The Story of the Nazarenes: The Formative Years.
[57] J. Matthew Price. We Teach Holiness: The Life and Work of H. Orton Wiley (1877-1961). Holiness Data Ministry, Digital Edition, Sept. 29, 2006.
[58] Ibid.
[59] Ibid.
[60] Ibid.
[61] Quanstrom.
[62] Ibid.
[63] Smith. Nazarenes And the Wesleyan Mission: Can We Learn from Our History?
[64] Smith. Called Unto Holiness. The Story of the Nazarenes: The Formative Years.
[65] Ibid.
[66] Smith. Nazarenes And the Wesleyan Mission: Can We Learn from Our History?
[67] Smith. Called Unto Holiness. The Story of the Nazarenes: The Formative Years.
[68] Wiley., ch. 30.
[69] Wiley., ch. 29.
[70] Ibid.
[71] Smith. Called Unto Holiness. The Story of the Nazarenes: The Formative Years.
[72] Robinson.
[73] Dr. Charles Perabeau. “Scholar Week Presentation: The Church of the Nazarene in the U.S.: Race, Class, and Gender and Aspirations Toward Respectability.” (presented at Olivet Nazarene University, Bourbonnais, Illinois, April 19, 2012).
[74] Ibid.
[75] Ibid.
[76] Ibid.
[77] Richard W. Houseal, Jr., B.A. “Women Clergy in the Church of the Nazarene: An Analysis of Change from 1908 to 1995. A Thesis in Sociology.” (Presented to the Faculty of the University of Missouri-Kansas City in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree master of arts Kansas City, Missouri, 1996.)
[78] Ibid.
[79] Stan Ingersol. “Your daughters shall prophesy.” Holiness Today, (March 2000).
[80] Dr. Janine T. Metcalf. “From Rhetoric to Reality: Putting into Practice Our Century-Old Polity of Gender Partnership in Ministry.” The International Church of the Nazarene Website. <http://www.nazarene.org>.
[81] Ingersol.
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