Paul Helm on Systematic and Biblical Theology

Helm’s Deep: Analysis 3 – Systematic and Biblical Theology provides an interesting look at the distinctions between systematic theology and biblical theology. For all those poo-pooing systematic theology these days in favor of “narrative” theology (which is really just a subset of biblical theology), this article makes the timely apples-to-oranges (or, in Helm’s analogy, circles-to-lines) distinction:

Of course systematic theology deals with temporal sequences – with the entire drama of redemption – and with sequences within that grand sequence, such as conversion, and the nature of the Christian life. But it does not treat these sequences simply or chiefly as sequences, but seeks to integrate their essential features with other aspects of God’s revelation which are not temporally sequential, aspects which have to do (in the old language which makes some people shudder), with essences and natures, such as the existence and nature of Almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and with human nature, prelapsarian, lapsed, redeemed and glorified. With the nature of faith, and the nature of sin.

Vos himself was fully at ease with the distinction between systematic theology and biblical theology, and with the legitimacy of each, being somewhat Berkhofish in his own right. (He was the author of a multi-volume systematic theology in Dutch). His view of the relation between the two is worth noting.

There is no difference in that one would be more closely bound to the Scriptures than the other. In this they are wholly alike. Nor does the difference lie in this, that the one transforms the Biblical material, whereas the other would leave it unmodified. Both equally make the truth deposited in the Bible undergo a transformation: but the difference arises from the fact that the principles by which the transformation is effected differ. In Biblical Theology the principle is one of historical, in Systematic Theology it is one of logical construction. Biblical Theology draws a line of development. Systematic Theology draws a circle. (15-16)

The insoluble problem that those who favour some kind of integration between biblical and systematic theology face is that they overlook this fundamental point: that logical distinctions do not necessarily correspond with temporal sequences, and that temporal sequences may have non-temporal aspects, or presuppose what is non-temporal.