Introduction
This article presents a Dutch transcription, English translation, and brief introduction to the (unpublished) peripheral archival notes of Herman Bavinck which he titled: “Praedestinatie I Troeltsch” (Bavinck, n.d.).[1] Bavinck’s notes highlight the salient features of Ernst Troeltsch’s 1907 essay on predestination.
Ernst Troeltsch (1865–1923) wrote directly on the doctrine of predestination on two occasions: The first was his essay “Prädestination,” which was published in two parts in the July and August 1907 issues of Die Christliche Welt as “Prädestination I” and “Prädestination II” (see Troeltsch 1907a, 1907b).[2] The second occasion was when Troeltsch revised and abbreviated this earlier essay and submitted it to the encyclopedia Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart in 1913 (Troeltsch 1913).
Bavinck’s archival notes on Troeltsch have at least a twofold interest. On behalf of Troeltsch studies, they reflect the reception of Troeltsch in the Netherlands. Bavinck and Troeltsch stand as two colossal figures at the turn of the twentieth century, and for either to be reading and taking notes on the other is intriguing. On behalf of Bavinck studies, the archival transcription and translation reflect not only an engagement with a significant German theologian but also display Bavinck’s ongoing interest in dogmatics, the phenomena of history, and the interplay between the two. Significantly, predestination for Troeltsch is that which drives the development of all of history and therefore is crucial to understanding his thought.
Bavinck’s notes here engage Troeltsch’s first set of reflections on predestination published in 1907. Although undated then, Bavinck’s notes would have to have been written after the August 1907 issue of Die Christliche Welt. The notes are among his material that Bavinck utilized in speeches on Christianity and Calvinism delivered in 1908 and 1909 in America. This is not to suggest that Bavinck prepared a speech on Troeltsch’s doctrine of predestination to deliver in America; rather that the notes were likely written during that time period, i.e. from late 1907 to 1909.
How does Troeltsch handle the doctrine of predestination? Troeltsch begins with the lived phenomena and ultimately considers how Christianity offers the highest form of religion. The preservation of divine grace in the idea of predestination is of great significance to Troeltsch (1907a, 713; 1991, 317). In his essay in the two issues of Die Christliche Welt, Troeltsch’s argument on predestination is placed into five points: (1) predestination’s relation to the practical; (2) predestination’s relation to the purpose of all things; (3) the retreat of predestination in the modern world; (4) the transformation of predestination in modern religious thought; and finally, (5) the ethical consequences of the idea of predestination. Bavinck’s archival notes engage with Troeltsch’s essay across all five points.
In the first point, Troeltsch traces the doctrine of predestination to the phenomena of practical life. In the realm of practical life, three outlets are provided for the doctrine of predestination. First, it provides life-purpose to those who confess it. Second, it provides a rationale for social diversity and individualism. Third, it promotes the consummate good over the dutiful good. In Bavinck’s notes he identifies the close relationship Troeltsch draws between religion and predestination. Following Troeltsch he then contrasts the anti-predestinarian (selfish values, prone to socialism) with the one who confesses predestination (sees God’s will in diversity, inequality, suffering, is less prone to socialism, more individualistic, an organ of the divine will), noting the practical differences.
In the second point, Troeltsch argues for the close union of both the purpose of all things and predestination in Christianity. Bavinck frames this in his notes as “wisdom.” Troeltsch sees this as resolving an ancient tension between the incomprehensible fact and the validity of laws and values that is present to all humans. Bavinck touches on this by drawing out several parallels that make this tension clear: “Will and mercy, origin and purpose, supra and infra, sovereignty and justice, power and ethos, world and personality.” For Troeltsch, Christianity adapts this historical tension and reframes it around the incomprehensibility of God, the world, and our experiences of reality—and the desire to relate the diversity of values to ultimate truths.
The third point begins the second part of the essay published in Die Christliche Welt in August 1907. Troeltsch explains why predestination retreated into the background of modern thought—and this is partially an apologetic for his own articulation of it. He provides three reasons for predestination’s fall from grace: First, the idea of difference was replaced by that of equality (predestination then embodied the horrid reality of inequality). Second, dogmatics increasingly treated predestination in an anthropomorphic direction. Third, predestination was eclipsed by the idea of reason (Troeltsch 1907b, 736–37). Bavinck’s notes align well with these three points: Toward the first he identifies the striving for equality and the presence of socialism. The anthropomorphic he associates with envisioning predestination as determinism. And finally, the idea of reason he unsurprisingly connects with Schopenhauer, romanticism, individualism, and Darwinism.
While Troeltsch acknowledges that predestination has retreated, he maintains that it has not disappeared. In his fourth point, he perceives the re-emergence of the phenomena of predestination as rooted in the phenomena of inequality. This is the result of the ancient tension between incomprehensible fact and the validity of laws and values needing to be re-interpreted by Christianity. How one interprets this tension will steer one’s understanding of human life and therefore predestination. If one embraces a groundless impersonal will, God’s sovereignty remains arbitrary. If one embraces an absolute and authentic personality, the more one will strive to participate in these values and the more one will acknowledge inequality and see in it the essence of the world, both of these pointing us to predestination and the Christian God (Troeltsch 1907b, 737–38). It is the latter that Bavinck records for us in his notes: “The foundation of everything lies in God’s will, sovereign unfathomable will. But this will must still be united with the absolute value and validity, so that this will ceases to be arbitrary, and all values on earth ultimately rest on the absolute-worthy will, that is in the religious.”
Without the two sides of this “ancient tension” it is impossible to imagine humans participating in the consummate good. It is this direction that Troeltsch moves in the fifth point. He seeks to harmonize this through the dutiful good becoming the consummate good as the divine will transforms the will of man into the will of God, which is love (Troeltsch 1907a, 714–16). This was a key idea for him in point two. In other words, in the notion of love the groundless will moves creatures to union with God and the finite crosses over into the infinite (Chapman 2010, 442). Troeltsch seems to posit the becoming of God as the creatures’ will becomes the groundless will of God (see Parker and Zoutendam 2023, 292, 294–95). The assumption is that Bavinck is not fond of Troeltsch’s proto-process formulation, as his notes restate Troeltsch in a way that harmonizes with his Reformed theology. For both, ethics is not a challenge to predestination. For Bavinck, this is because predestination cultivates activity and makes way for the individual to partake in God’s creative power, in love of God and neighbor. All things belong to God as our will harmonizes with God’s will.
Praedestinatie I Troeltsch[3]
[1] Praedest[inatie], gratia, religio, staan in nauw verband. Zoolang het relig[ieus] denken de menschen beheerschte, was de praed[estinatie] aan de orde. De zuiverheid der religie wordt alleen bij de praed[estinatie] bewaard. De praed[estinatianus] ziet [he]t leven, de werkelijkheid, de wereld anders aan. Ziet in de ongelijkheid der menschen, in de verscheidenheid, in het lijden enz. Gods wil, berust erin, schik er zich naar. [Illegible] wereld niet naar menschelijk, egoist[isch] waarden, hulp minder zorgen en onzekerheden, is minder socialistisch (allen deel aan [he]t zelfde), meer individualistisch, laat meer elk individu zijn eigen weg gaan, is in zoover democratisch maar handhaafs in [he]t democratisch allerlei arist[ocratisch] onderscheidingen, beschouwd z[ich] als orgaan van den gods[dienstig] wil en doet zoo eerst het ware goede rust in den ondoorgrondelijkheid wil v[an] alle zijn, zoozijn. Alles worstelt in [he]t oneindije, ondoorgrondelijke, in den reinen wil Gods. Niemand, niets mag klagen, aanklagen; mensch is geen hond.
Maar die wil toch één, geen willekeur, geen hoop willingen, maar verbonden met wijsheid, heeft rede voor zijn willen, stelt zich een doel, waarde, wordt gelerd door wet en normen. De wil is op [he]t hoogste weer liefde, genade. Deze z[ijn] naast elkaar. Wil en genade, oorzaak, doel, supra en infra, souverein[iteit] en gerechtigheid, macht en ethos, wereld en persoonlijkheid, goed omdat God [he]t wil en God wil het omdat het goed is.
Tegenov[er] heeft men praed[estinatianus]-gedachte op zij gezet. Mensch boven God verheven, in plaats v[an] God gesteld, naar gelijkheid voor allen gestreefd. Social[isme] is tegen praedest[inatie], en ook het determinism is niet = praed[estinatie]. Maar praed[estinatie] komt altijd op uit het irrationeele in de wereld en uit de ongelijkheden, de differenzierungen enz. De wilsleer v[an] Schop[enhauer] [2] het Darwin[isme]; het romant[iek], individualisme enz is eraan verwant. De gedacht der praedest[inatie] is dus niet overwonnen maar bestaat nog. Grond v[an] alles ligt in wil Gods, souvereinen ondoorgrondelijken wil. Maar die wil moet toch verenigd met het absoluut waardevolle en geldige, zoodat die wil ophoudt willekeur te zijn, en alle waarden op aarde den slotte rusten, in de absoluut-waardigen wil, dat is in [he]t religieuze. En voorts openbaart zich die wil, dan in eigen zin als praedest[inatie], als oorzaak van de verschillende mate graad tijd waarin schepselen, mensche aan dat absoluut waardevolle deel hebben. In deze [illegible] marken das algemeenheid werkelijkheid in individualiteit (persoonl[ijk]), [he]t religeuze door God geschonken goed (genade) en [he]t ethische door om te realisieren goed (wil v[an] mensch, verantw[oordlijkheid] enz), roeping van allen [illegible] [he]t heil en deel van [he]t heil = zeer verschillende mate vernoemd—Praed[estinatie] is niet te bestrijdt = naam v[an] ethiek, want [kweekt] activiteit, versterking v[an] den individu; God deelt zich nu in Praed[estinatie] als wil en scheppende kracht, schept scheppingslust, betoont z[ich] in liefde tot God en naaste; de gepredestineerde weet nooit van anderen dat hij [he]t niet is, beschouwt hem altijd als toch ergens toe gepredestineerd, wacht hem daartoe te helpen. Alles is van God, alle moment, beroep, arbeid: wet wordt tot liefde, ethiek tot religie, eigen wil [illegible] Gods wil.
Predestination I Troeltsch[4]
[Page 1] Praedestinatie, gratia, [and] religio stand in close connection. As long as religious thinking has dominated mankind, praedestinatie has been on the agenda. The purity of religion is only preserved by praedestinatie. Praedestinatianus perceives life, reality, the world, differently. It sees in the inequality of people, in diversity, in suffering, etc. God’s will, rests therein, conforms to it. [Illegible] world not according to human, egotistical values, it has fewer worries and uncertainties, it is less socialistic (all share in the same thing), more individualistic, lets each individual go his own way, it is in this sense democratic but maintains all sorts of aristocratic distinctions in the democratic, it regards itself as an organ of the divine will and thus only makes the true good rest in the incomprehensible will of all being, being in such a manner. All things struggle in the infinite, unfathomable, in the pure will of God. Nobody, no one can complain, accuse; man is not a dog.[5]
But that will nevertheless is one, not arbitrary, not a heap of willings, but connected with wisdom, has a reason for its will, sets a goal, value, is governed through laws and norms. The will is at the highest point love, grace. These are side by side. Will and mercy, origin [and] purpose, supra and infra, sovereignty and justice, power and ethos, world and personality, [it is] good because God wills it and God wills it because it is good.
The opposite is the case when praedestinatianus-thinking is put to the side. Man is [then] exalted above God, set in the place of God, and strives for equality for all. Socialism is against praedestinatie and also determinism is not = praedestinatie. But praedestinatie always arises from the irrational in the world and out of inequality, the distinctions,[6] etc. The teaching of the will of Schopenhauer, [Page 2] Darwinism, romanticism, individualism, etc. are all related to this. The thought of praedestinatie is not overcome but still exists. The foundation of everything lies in God’s will, sovereign unfathomable will. But this will must still be united with the absolute value and validity, so that this will ceases to be arbitrary, and all values on earth ultimately rest on the absolute-worthy will, that is in the religious. And furthermore, this will then reveals itself in its own sense as praedestinatie, as the cause of the varying degrees of time in which creatures, humanity, participate in that absolute value. In these [illegible] marks that universal reality in individuality (personal), the religious good given by God (grace) and the ethical good to be realized through us (will of man, responsibility, etc.), calling of all [illegible] to salvation and to partake in salvation = to greatly differing degrees named— Praedestinatie is not to be challenged = the name of ethics, because it cultivates activity, strengthening of the individual; God now partakes in praedestinatie as will and creative power, he creates the desire to create, this shows itself in love for God and neighbor; the predestined never knows if others are not [i.e. are predestinated or not], always regards [that person] as predestined to something, waits to help to that end. Everything belongs to God, every moment, calling, vocation: law becomes love, ethics becomes religion, our will [illegible] God’s will.
See Bavinck (n.d.). Although Bavinck labeled his archival notes “Praedestinatie I,” he engaged with both “Prädestination I” and “Prädestination II.”
For an English translation of Troeltsch’s essay see Parker Jr. and Zoutendam (2023, 290–311).
This section provides a transcription of the Dutch text of Herman Bavinck’s notes. As these notes were prepared as an unpublished manuscript, Bavinck often supplied words in abbreviated form. For the sake of clarity, I have suggested the remainder of these words, as indicated by the use of brackets (for example “Praedest[inatie]”). Latin and German words have been italicized.
This section provides an English translation of the Dutch text of Herman Bavinck’s notes.
In Troeltsch’s essay he quotes Calvin’s Institutes 3.22.1 at this point; see Calvin (2008, 615–16) and Parker and Zoutendam (2023, 299). In this section of the Institutes Calvin argues that God does not elect according to foreknowledge or merit, but simply bestows grace on whom he would. That man was gifted the image of God is rooted in the beauty of God’s grace and election. The gift of election comes with the gift of holiness, that the church might be worthy of the gift given to her. Man is then not like a dog or an ox. In Troeltsch’s essay he picks out this quote from Calvin to amplify that one should not complain if they are not a Christian; after all, “he could just as well be a dog or a pig.” This is unproblematic for Troeltsch as all have some small share in God’s endless becoming.
I have provided a translation for the sake of smoothness, but it should be noted that Bavinck deploys a German word.