Book Reviews -- By: Anonymous

Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 125:500 (Oct 1968)
Article: Book Reviews
Author: Anonymous


Book Reviews

A History Of The Brethren Movement: Its Origins, Its Worldwide Development And Its Significance For The Present Day. By F. Roy Coad. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Company, 1968. 327 pp. $6.95.

This is a significant and well documented history of the so-called “Plymouth Brethren” by one who has long family connections with this movement. Educated at Peter Symonds’ School in Winchester, England, the author is a Chartered Accountant and a founder of the Christian Brethren Research Fellowship. His volume makes interesting and thought-provoking reading.

One extremely unfortunate feature of this history, however, is its transparent lack of sympathy with Mr. J. N. Darby. The author seems to possess a thinly concealed antipathy for Darby’s prophetic and dispensational teachings as well as for his strong views on the evils of doctrinal error and apostasy. One need not justify all of Mr. Darby’s actions in the heat of controversy to see the need in our day for greater appreciation of the spiritually damaging effects of false doctrine. It is, therefore, a rash assessment of so outstanding a servant of God to say of him, as this author does, that he was a “man of so much good and so very much more wrong” (p. 231).

Quite rightly, the writer takes up the question of Biblical authority as a crucial factor in the movement he is discussing. It is clear that he is aware of the impact of form criticism on contemporary thought, though he does not mention the term. We are left, however, uncertain as to the writer’s own view of the Bible, in particular whether he regards it as infallible and inerrant. In like manner, the author has one eye cocked toward the ecumenical movement to which he seems to be appealing for toleration of independent groups like the “Brethren.” Clearly sensing the dangers of centralized religious control, he seems blandly unconcerned for the element of genuine “apostasy” in modern ecumenism. Thus, when he comes to defining what it is that makes a Christian (which he correctly sees is pivotal to the problem of Christian unity), he manages to be sufficiently vague about the essential content of one’s faith so that we cannot tell how “liberal” a man’s theology may be before we cease to regard him as Christian.

It may be sadly affirmed that, if the doctrinal vagueness of this

writer had been a leading characteristic of the movement he chronides (which, thanks to Darby, it has not been), the so-called “Brethren” would not be today the vital force for our Lord Jesus Christ that they actually are.

Z. C. Hodges

The Eternal Covenant: Schleiermacher’...

You must have a subscription and be logged in to read the entire article.
Click here to subscribe
visitor : : uid: ()