Could it be that the Emergent Church has its roots in the Reformation? If the EC ever solidifies into anything historically significant (it won’t), will they count Erasmus as one of their Church Fathers? In 1524, Desiderius Erasmus published Diatribe seu collation de libero arbitrio (Diatribe on Free Will). Luther responded in 1525 with De Servo Arbitrio (On the Enslaved Will), which we know as The Bondage of the Will. I have just begun reading Luther’s work and, so far, his words and those of the translators in their introduction seem strikingly applicable to the EC.

Consider this passage from the translator’s Historical and Theological Introduction:

   Why did Erasmus and Luther approach the discussion of ‘free-will’ in such contrasting attitudes of mind? The answer is not far to seek. Their divergent attitudes sprang from two divergent conceptions of Christianity. Erasmus held that matters of doctrine were all comparatively unimportant, and that the issue as to whether a man’s will was or was not free was more unimportant than most. Luther, on the other hand, held that doctrines were essential to, and constructive of, the Christian religion, and that the doctrine of the bondage of the will in particular was the corner-stone of the Gospel and the very foundation of faith. Here we are confronted with the deepest difference that there was, or could have been, between the two men; and we must say a little more about it.
   Christianity, to Erasmus, was essentially morality, with a minimum of doctrinal statement loosely appended. What Erasmus professed that he desire to see in Christendom was a return to an apostolic ‘simplicity’ of life and doctrine, and this he thought could be brought about simply by eliminating the superstitions and abuses which had crept into the Church’s life over the centuries. The Reformation that Erasmus actually advocated under the name of ‘the philosophy of Christ’ as the true, slimmed, ‘simple’ version of Christianity, turns out on inspection to be no more than a barren moralism. Erasmus recognizes no organic dependence of practice upon faith. That the life which pleases God springs only from living trust in Christ as the Word of God sets Him forth that is something that the great humanist never saw. That is why he could profess to find so little pleasure in theological dogmatizing that he would gladly side with the Sceptics whenever Scripture and the Church allowed him to do so although, as he hastened to explain, he uniformly submitted his judgment to these authorities, whether he understood the reasons for what they ordained or not. Luther takes him severely to task for this remark, and not without justice. Erasmus cannot be acquitted of the charge of doctrinal indifferentism. His attitude was that what one believes about the mysteries of the faith does not much matter; what the Church lays down may safely be accepted, whether right or wrong, for the details of a churchman’s doctrine will not affect his living as a Christian in this world, nor his eventual destiny in the world to come therefore, however sure one might be that the Church was a some point wrong, one is never justified in disrupting Christendom about it (as Luther was doing); peace in the Church was of more value than any doctrine. The churchman would be wise not to bother his head about problems of doctrinal definition, but to concern himself simply with guiding his life by the moral law of Christ. In particular, the question as to whether or not man’s will is free, to Erasmus’ mind, can be ignored with perfect safety; it can have no possible bearing on man’s endeavor to keep the law of Christ, except perhaps to distract and discourage him. Wisdom and humanity alike dissuade us from prying too deeply into such an abstruse subject; and it is a sign of pride and folly when a man lays much stress upon it. The Christian church is better off without rash ventures of that sort. [emphasis added]

At first glance, Erasmus’ stated willingness to submit to Scripture and the Church may seem incompatible with the EC, but it really is not. Like Erasmus, the EC gives the desultory nod to Scripture. At the same time, any dogma (however noncommittal) is the result of a consensus (however loose) of “the community,” which is the EC’s version of the Church. Erasmus’ main resemblance to the EC is, obviously, his disdain for dogma and his willingness to discard doctrine as unimportant and even harmful.

In Luther’s own introduction, he takes Erasmus to task for an offense that screams EC to even the most casual observer:

I forbear at the moment to mention further the fact that, in your usual way, you have taken vast pains throughout to be slippery and evasive. You are more canny than Ulysses in the way you suppose yourself to be steering between Scylla and Charybdis—you would have nothing actually asserted, yet you would seem to assert something! Who, I ask, but one who could catch Proteus himself could bring forth anything to touch people like you?

Luther begins his Review of Erasmus’ Preface by demonstrating “the necessity of assertions in Christianity.”

Away, now, with Sceptics and Academics from the company of us Christians; let us have men who will assert, men twice as inflexible as very Stoics! Take the Apostle Paul—how often does he call for that ‘full assurance’ which is, simply, an assertion of conscience, of the highest degree of certainty and conviction. In Rom. 10 he calls it ‘confession’—‘with the mouth confession is made unto salvation’ (v. 10). Christ says, ‘Whosoever confesseth me before men, him will I confess before my Father’ (Matt.10.32). Peter commands us to give a reason for the hope that is in us (I Pet. 3.15). And what need is there of a multitude of proofs? Nothing is more familiar of characteristic among Christians than assertion, take away assertions, and you take away Christianity. Why, the Holy Spirit is given to Christians from heaven in order that He may glorify Christ and in them confess Him even unto death—and is this not assertion, to die for what you confess and assert? Again, the Spirit asserts to such purpose that He breaks in upon the whole world and convinces it of sin (cf. John 16.8), as if challenging it to battle. Paul tells Timothy to reprove, and to be instant out of season (2 Tim. 4.2); and what a clown I should think a man to be who did not really believe, nor unwaveringly assert, those things concerning which he reproved others! I think I should send him to Anticyra! [Anticyra was a health resort used for treating mental illness.]
   But I am the biggest fool of all for wasting time and words on something that is clearer to see that the sun. What Christian can endure the idea that we should deprecate assertions? That would be denying all religion and piety in one breath—asserting that religion and piety are nothing at all. Why then do you—you!—assert that you find no satisfaction in assertions and that you prefer an undogmatic temper to any other? [italics original, boldface added]

What do you think? Could Luther not have been writing to Brian McLaren and his ilk? I could continue offering examples, but since I find Luther’s words more delightful to read than to type, I will return to reading, and encourage you to do the same.

“Of the perspicuity of Scripture”
taken from The Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther:

Now I come to another point, which is linked with this. You divide Christian doctrines into two classes, and make out that we need to know the one but not the other. ‘Some,’ you say, ‘are recondite, whereas others are quite plain.’ Surely at this point you are either playing tricks with someone else’s words, or practicing a literary effect! However, you quote in your support Paul’s words in Rom. 11: ‘O the depth of both the riches and knowledge of God!’ (v. 33); and also Isa. 40: ‘Who gave help o the Spirit of the Lord, or who hath been his counsellor?” (v. 13). It was all very easily said, either because you knew that you were writing, not just to Luther, but for the world at large, or else because you failed to consider that it was against Luther that you were writing! I hope you credit Luther with some little scholarship and judgment where the sacred text is concerned? If not, behold! I will wring the admission out of you! Here is my distinction (for I too am going to do a little lecturing—or chop a little logic, should I say?): God and his Scriptures are two things, just as the Creator and his creation are two things. Now, nobody questions that there is a great deal hid in God of which we know nothing. Christ himself says of the last day: ‘Of that day knoweth no man, but the father’ (Matt. 24.36); and in Acts 1 he says: ‘It is not for you to know the times and seasons’ (v. 7); and again, he says: ‘I know whom I have chosen’ (John 13.18); and Paul says; ‘The Lord knoweth them that are his’ (2 Tim. 2.19); and the like. But the notion that in Scripture some things are recondite and all is not plain was spread by the godless Sophists (whom now you echo, Erasmus)—who have never yet cited a single item to prove their crazy view; nor can they. And Satan has used these unsubstantial specters to scare men off reading the sacred text, and to destroy all sense of its value, so as to ensure that his own poisonous philosophy reigns supreme in the church. I certainly grant that many passages in the Scriptures are obscure and hard to elucidate, but that is due, not to the exalted nature of their subject, but to our own linguistic and grammatical ignorance; and it does not in any way prevent our knowing all the contents of Scripture. For what solemn truth can the Scriptures still be concealing, now that the seals are broken, the stone rolled away from the door of the tomb, and the greatest of all mysteries brought to light—that Christ, God's Son, became man, that God is Three in One, that Christ suffered for us, and will reign forever? Are not these things known, and sung in our streets? Take Christ from the Scriptures—and what more will you find in them? You see, then, that the entire content of the Scriptures are as clear as can be, to pronounce them obscure on account of those few obscure words. if words are obscure in one place, they are clear in another. What God has so plainly declared to the world is in some parts of Scripture stated in plain words, while in other parts it still lies hidden under obscure words. But when something stands in broad daylight, and a mass of evidence for it is in broad daylight also, it does not matter if there is any evidence for it in the dark. Who will maintain that the town fountain does not stand in the light because the people down some alley cannot see it, while everyone else in the square can see it?
   There is nothing, then in your remark about the ‘Corycian cavern’; matters are not so in the Scriptures. The profoundest mysteries of the supreme Majesty are no more hidden away, but are now brought out of doors and displayed to public view. Christ has opened our understanding, that we might understand the Scriptures, and the Gospel in preached to every creature, ‘Their sound is gone out into all lands’ (Ps. 19.4). ‘All things that are written, are written for instruction’ (Rom. 15.4). Again: ‘All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for instruction (2 Tim. 3.16). Come forward then, you, and all the Sophists with you, and cite a single mystery which is still obscure in the Scripture. I know that to many people a great deal remains obscure; but that is due, not to any lack of clarity in Scripture, but to their own blindness and dullness, in that they make no effort to see truth which, in itself, could not be plainer. As Paul said of the Jews in 2 Cor. 4: ‘The veil remains on their heart’ (2 Cor. 3.15); and again ‘If our gospel be hid, it is hid to then that are lost, whose hearts the god of this world hath blinded’ (2 Cor. 4.3–4). They are like men who cover their eyes, of go from daylight into darkness, and hide there and then blame the sun, of the darkness of the day for their inability to see, so let wretched men abjure that blasphemous perversity which would blame the darkness of their own hears on to the plain Scriptures of God!
   When you quote Paul’s statement, ‘his judgments are incomprehensible, you seem to take the pronoun ‘his’ to refer to Scripture; whereas the judgments which Paul there affirms to be incomprehensible are not those of Scripture but those of God. And Isaiah 40 does not say ‘who has known the mind of Scripture?’ but: ‘who has know the mind of the Lord?’ (Paul indeed, asserts that Christians do know the mind of the Lord; but only with reference to those things that are given to us by God, as he there says in 1 Cor. 2 (v.12). You see, then, how sleepily you examined those passages, and how apt in your citation of them—as apt are almost all your citations for ‘free-will’! So, too, the examples of obscurity which you allege in that rather sarcastic passage are quite irrelevant—the distinction of persons in the God head, the union of the Divine and human natures of Christ, and the unpardonable sin. Here, you say, are problems which have never been solved. If you mean this of the enquiries which the Sophists pursue when they discuss these subjects, what has the inoffensive Scripture done to you, that you should blame such criminal misuse of it on to its own purity? Scripture makes the straightforward affirmation that the Trinity, the Incarnation and the unpardonable sin are facts. There is nothing obscure or ambiguous about that. You imagine that Scripture tells us how they are what they are; but it does not, nor need we know. It is here that the Sophists discuss their dreams; keep your criticism and condemnation for them, but acquit the Scriptures! If, on the other hand, you mean it of the facts themselves, I say again: blame, not the Scriptures, but the Arians and those to whom the Gospel is hid, who, but reason of the working of Satan, their god, cannot see the plainest proofs of the Trinity in Godhead and of the humanity of Christ.
   In a word: the perspicuity of Scripture is twofold, just as there is a double lack of light. The first is external, and relates to the ministry of the Word; the second concerns the knowledge of the heart. If you speak of internal perspicuity, the truth is that nobody who has not the Spirit of God sees a jot of what is in the Scriptures. All men have their hearts darkened, so that, even when they can discuss and quote all that is in Scripture, they do not understand or really know any of it. They do not believe in God, nor do they believe that they are God’s creatures, nor anything else—as Ps. 13 puts it, ‘The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God’ (Ps. 14.1). The Spirit is needed for the understanding of all Scripture and every part of Scripture. If, on the other hand, you speak of external perspicuity, the position is that nothing whatsoever is left obscure or ambiguous, but all that is in the Scripture is through the Word brought forth into the clearest light and proclaimed to the whole world.

From The Bondage of the Will by Martin Luther:

[Erasmus asks] What use or need is there, then, of publishing such things [controversial writings such as these on free will], when so many harmful results seem likely to follow?

[Luther replies]: It should be enough to say simply that God has willed their publication, and the reason of the Divine will is not to be sought, but simply to be adored, and the glory given to God, Who, since He alone is just and wise, wrongs none and can do nothing foolish or inconsiderate—however much it may seem otherwise to us. This answer will satisfy those who fear God. However (to say a little more than I need, since there is so much more that I can say), there are two considerations which require the preaching of these truths. The first is the humbling of our pride, and the comprehending of the grace of God; the second is the nature of Christian faith.

For the first: God has surely promised His grace to the humbled: that is, to those who mourn over and despair of themselves. But a man cannot be thoroughly humbled till he realises that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, counsels, efforts, will and works, and depends absolutely on the will, counsel, pleasure and work of Another—God alone. As long as he is persuaded that he can make even the smallest contribution to his salvation, he remains self-confident and does not utterly despair of himself, and so is not humbled before God; but plans out for himself (or at least hopes and longs for) a position, an occasion, a work, which shall bring him final salvation. But he who is out of doubt that his destiny depends entirely on the will of God despairs entirely of himself, chooses nothing for himself, but waits for God to work in him; and such a man is very near to grace for his salvation.

So these truths are published for the sake of the elect, that they may be humbled and brought down to nothing, and so saved. The rest of men resist this humiliation; indeed, they condemn the teaching of self-despair; they want a little something left that they can do for themselves. Secretly they continue proud, and enemies of the grace of God. This, I repeat, one reason—that those who fear God might in humility comprehend, claim and receive His gracious promise.

The second reason is this: faith’s object is things not seen. That there may be room for faith, therefore, all that is believed must be hidden. Yet it is not hidden more deeply than under a contrary appearance of sight, sense and experience. Thus, when God quickens, He does so by killing; when He justifies, He does so by pronouncing guilty; when He carries up to heaven, He does so by bringing down to hell. As Scripture says in 1 Kings 2, ‘The Lord killeth and maketh alive; He bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up’ (1 Sam. 2.6). (This is no place for a fuller account of these things; but those who have read my books are well acquainted with them.) Thus God conceals His eternal mercy and loving kindness beneath eternal wrath, His righteousness beneath unrighteousness. Now, the highest degree of faith is to believe that He is merciful, though He saves so few and damns so many; to believe that He is just, though of His own will He makes us perforce proper subjects for damnation, and seems (in Erasmus’ words) ‘to delight in the torments of poor wretches and to be a fitter object for hate than for love.’ If I could by any means understand how this same God, who makes such a show of wrath and unrighteousness, can yet be merciful and just, there would be no need for faith. But as it is, the impossibility of understanding makes room for the exercise of faith when these things are preached and published; just as, when God kills, faith in life is exercised in death.

—Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will (Revell, 1957) 100-101.

Anyone who has argued much with Catholics against Roman Catholicism has heard this question: “If the Catholic Church is not the true church, then where was the church for all the centuries between the alleged apostasy of Rome and the Reformation?” Dr. Luther says:

In passing, I will here reply to the passage where you [Erasmus] describe it as unbelievable that God should overlook an error in His church for so many ages, and not reveal to any of His saints a point which we maintain to be fundamental in Christian doctrine. In the first place, we do not say that God tolerated this error in His church, or in any of His saints. For the church is ruled by the Spirit of God, and Rom. 8 tells us that the saints are led by the Spirit of God (v. 14). And Christ abides with His church till the end of the world (Matt. 28.20). And the church is the pillar and ground of the truth (i Tim. 3.15). This we know; for the Creed which we all hold runs thus, ‘I believe in the holy catholic church.’ So it is impossible that she should err in even the least article. Even should we grant that some of the elect are held in error throughout their whole life, yet they must of necessity return into the way before they die; for Christ says in John 8: ‘None shall pluck them out of my hand’ (John 10.28). But what is hard and problematical is just this: ascertaining whether those whom you call the church were the church—or, rather, whether after their lifetime of error they were at last brought back to the truth before they died. It does not at once follow that, if God suffered all those consummate scholars whom you quote to err throughout so many ages, therefore He suffered His church to err! Look at Israel, the people of God. There, out of a great number of kings over a long period of time, not one king is mentioned who did not err. Under Elijah the prophet, all the people and every public institution among them had gone astray into idolatry, so that he thought he was the only one left; yet, while the kings and princes, priests and prophets, and all that could be called the people and church of God, were going to ruin, God had reserved seven thousand to Himself (cf. i Kings 19.18). But who saw them, or knew them to be the people of God ? And who will dare to deny that in our day, under these principal men of yours (for you only mention persons of public office and of great name), God has kept to Himself a church among the common people, while allowing all whom you mention to perish like the kingdom of Israel? For it is God’s prerogative to bring down the chosen ones of Israel, and, as Ps. 77 says, to slay their fat ones (Ps. 78.31); but to preserve the dregs and remnant of Israel, according to Isaiah’s words (cf. Isa. 10.22).
   What happened under Christ Himself, when all the apostles were offended at Him, when He was denied and condemned by all the people, and only Joseph, Nicodemus and the thief on the cross were preserved? Was it not the former group who were then called the people of God? Indeed, there was a people of God remaining, but it was not so called; and that which was so called was not it. Who knows whether, throughout the whole course of world history from its beginning, the state of the church has not always been such that some were called the people and saints of God who were not so, while others, who were among them as a remnant, were the people and saints of God, but were not so called?—as appears from the histories of Cain and Abel, Ishmael and Isaac, Esau and Jacob. Look at the time of the Arians, when scarcely five catholic bishops were preserved in the whole world, and they were driven from their sees, while the Arians reigned everywhere, taking to themselves the public name and office of the church. Yet under these heretics Christ preserved His church; though in such a way that it was not for a moment thought or held to be the church.
   Or show me a single bishop discharging his office under the kingdom of the Pope. Show me a single council at which they dealt with matter of religion, and not with gowns, rank, revenues and other profane trifles instead, which only a lunatic could consider the province of the Holy Ghost! Yet they are called the church, despite the fact that all who live as they do are lost, and are anything but the church. Even under them, however, Christ has preserved His church, though not so as to be called the church. How many saints do you think the Inquisitors alone have in time past burned and killed for heretical perversions, such as John Hus and those like him? And many holy men of the same spirit doubtless lived in their day.
   Why do you not rather marvel at this, Erasmus: Since the world began, there have always been superior talents, greater learning, and a more intense earnestness among pagans than among Christians and the people of God. It is as Christ Himself acknowledges: ‘the sons of this world are wiser than the sons of light’ (Luke 16.8). What Christian can be compared with Cicero alone (to say nothing of the Greeks) for ability, learning and hard work? What then shall we say hindered them from finding grace? For they certainly exerted ‘free-will’ to the utmost of their power! Who dare say that not one among them pursued truth with all his heart? Yet we are bound to maintain that not one of them reached it. Will you say in this case too that it is unbelievable that God abandoned so many great men throughout the whole course of history and let them strive in vain? Certainly, if ‘free-will’ has any being and power at all, its being and power must have been present with such men as these, in some one case at least! But it availed nothing; indeed, it always wrought in the wrong direction; so that by this argument alone it can be proved clearly enough that ‘free-will’ is nothing at all, inasmuch as one can show no trace of it from beginning to end of the world!
   But I return to the matter in hand. What wonder, if God should leave all the great men of the church to go their own ways, when He thus allowed all the nations to go their own ways, as Paul says in Acts (cf. Acts 14.16) ? My good Erasmus, God’s church is not so common a thing as the term ‘God’s church’; nor are God’s saints so promiscuously found as the phrase ‘God’s saints.’ The saints are pearls and precious jewels, which the Spirit does not cast before swine; but (as Scripture puts it) He keeps them hid, that the wicked may not see the glory of God! Else, if they were open to the recognition of all, how could they be so vexed and afflicted in the world as they are? So Paul says: ‘Had they known him, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory’ (i Cor. 2.8).
   I do not say this because I deny that those whom you cite are the saints and church of God; but because it cannot be proved that they really are saints, should anyone deny it; it is left completely uncertain; which means that no position is sufficiently guaranteed by their holiness to make good any doctrine. I call them saints, and so regard them; I call them the church, and so judge them—but by the rule of charity, not by the rule of faith. By which I mean that charity, which always thinks the best of everyone, and is not suspicious, but believes and assumes all good of its neighbour, calls every baptized person a saint. There is no danger involved if she is wrong; it is the way of charity to be deceived, for she is open to all the uses and abuses of every man, as being handmaid of all, good and bad, believing and unbelieving, true and false. Faith, however, calls none a saint but him who is proclaimed such by divine sentence; for the way of faith is not to be deceived. Therefore, though we should all look on each other as saints as a matter of charity, none should be declared a saint as a matter of faith, as if it were an article of faith that so-and-so is a saint. (In this way, that adversary of God, the Pope, canonizes as saints men of his own choice, whom he never knew, so setting himself in God’s place [cf. 2 Thess. 2.4].) All that I say of those saints of yours—ours, rather—is this: that, since they differ among themselves, those should rather have been followed who spoke best (that is, for grace against ‘free-will’), leaving aside those who through weakness of the flesh testified of the flesh rather than of the Spirit. So, too, in the case of those who are inconsistent, the places where they speak from the Spirit should have been picked out and held fast, and those where they savour of the flesh let go. This is the right course for the Christian reader, as being the clean beast that parts the hoof and chews the cud (cf. Lev. 11.3; Deut. 14.6)! But as it is we abandon our judgment and swallow everything indiscriminately; or else (what is more wretched still) we reject the better and acclaim the worse in one and the same author, and proceed to affix to those same worse parts the title and authority of his sanctity—which he gained, not by reason of ‘free-will’ or the flesh, but by reason of that which is best of all, even of the Spirit only!

—Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will (Revell, 1957) pp. 119-123.

The New Testament, properly speaking, consists of promises and exhortations, just as the Old, properly speaking, consists of laws and threats. In the New Testament, the gospel is preached and this is just the word that offers the Spirit and grace for the remission of sins which was procured for us by Christ crucified. It is all entirely free, given by the mercy of God the Father alone as He shows His favour towards us, who are unworthy, and who deserve condemnation rather than anything else. Exhortations follows after this; and they are intended to stir up those who have obtained mercy and have been justified already, to be energetic in bringing forth the fruits of the Spirit and of the righteousness given them, to exercise themselves in love and good works, and boldly to bear the cross and all the other tribulations of this world. This is the whole sum of the New Testament.

—Martin Luther, The Bondage of the Will (Revell 1957) 180.