Alastair McGrath's Christianity's Dangerous Idea is one of the more audacious and bold critiques of the Protestant Reformation to have been released in recent years. The book itself addresses the idea of personal interpretation of the Bible, and shows how the Protestant Reformation's ideas have spread and changed throughout history. While the message has undoubtedly led to an incredible increase in awareness and expansion of the church, McGrath claims it has locked the church into a series of smaller debates that are absolutely without resolution. While McGrath asks some very good questions about the nature of independent though, his fundamental problem - that this thought has led to unwinnable debates and splintering of ideas, and therefore is bad - is surprisingly anti-intellectual.
The Protestant Reformation, and the ways it has changed the church irrevocably, are the subject of this book. According to McGrath, "The dangerous new idea, firmly embodied at the heart of the Protestant revolution, was that all Christians have the right to interpret the Bible for themselves. However, it ultimately proved uncontrollable, spawning developments that few at the time could have envisaged or predicted"1. This idea is at the heart of the book as well - McGrath is extremely concerned with how the decision to allow the Bible to be interpreted by different people has affected the church as a whole.
McGrath takes us through the history of the Protestant Reformation, from its origins in 16th century Europe to today. "The transformation of Protestantism in the twentieth century was the outcome of many forces, social and cultural as much as theological, that combined to give a new lease of life and sense of identity to a movement that seemed to some to be about to run into the enfolding sands of history in the Aftermath of the First World War"2. After the Reformation, however, McGrath argues that there was very little theology of mission that was established in the beginning, which is thought to be a crucial misstep. While this may seem to be just a response to the Calvinist and English Reformations, McGrath's argument is that deemphasizing the spreading of missionary spirit has led to very defensive traditions that are adhered to only by those followers specifically.
My personal interaction with the book is one of both interest and skepticism - the claims that McGrath is making are very bold and brash, and require a substantial amount of support if I am going to be able to accept them. McGrath states that “'the Reformation' introduced into the history of Christianity a dangerous new idea that gave rise to an unparalleled degree of creativity and growth, on the one hand, while on the other causing new tensions and debates that, by their very nature, probably lie beyond resolution. The development of Protestantism as a major religious force in the world has been shaped decisively by the creative tensions emerging from this principle"3. McGrath makes some very excellent points about the beginning of the Protestant Reformation - in essence, Christianity was long overdue for a revamping that accommodated a civilization escaping the trappings of feudalism. To that end, Martin Luther and the rest of the Protestant leaders created a new system of religion, one which challenged one of the most fundamental questions one could ask about God: is it the institution that is permitted to create and set doctrine, or is it up to the individual? Is there a canonistic interpretation of the Bible that must be adhered to, or can people make up their own minds about what the central idea of the Bible might be?
McGrath's theological and historiographic perspective is very blue-collar, and very little deals with incredibly deep issues regarding the church, opting instead for the personal and historical groundwork over centuries of Protestant existence. By framing Protestantism in terms of what it is meant to do for the community, he criticizes it for becoming too personal, too obsessed with confirming one's own beliefs. Priesthood is meant to be directed out at the people it is preaching to, instead of just providing a defense for what one believes themselves. That being said, McGrath denotes the good that Protestantism has done throughout the years, from providing a foundation for challenging the stifling nature of the church in the Middle Ages to providing ample room for change and improvisation in political and religious systems today.
This central dilemma is what led to the Protestant Reformation, and the movement has expanded ever since. The dangerousness of the idea, says McGrath, comes as the natural progression of having such an individualistic interpretation of the Bible: of course, people are going to have conflicting ideas about what it means. Some people believe that homosexuality is considered a sin in the Bible, while others take a more liberal interpretation. Some think that the foundation of Christianity is faith, while others believe it is through good works. McGrath argues that, once Pandora's Box was opened to include the freedom to interpret the Bible as they saw fit, it would eventually go too far - a far cry from what the Protestant Reformation was meant to be about.
Despite McGrath's discussion of the universality of the Protestant faith, and his insistence that it has led to irreconcilable conflicts that divide those with the faith, his book is disappointingly Anglo-American in perspective. McGrath does touch on the role of Protestantism in other sections of the globe in several instances, however; the global South is said in the book to be the new home for Protestantism. Latin America, Africa and other regions are adopting Protestantism at record rates, and they seem to maintain a more conservative, traditionalist view of Christianity than in Europe or America today. "As a result, the Protestant denominations of the global South tend to have more in common with each other than with their counterparts in America or Europe"4. However, this also supports his thesis that the unified mores in the global South are directly opposed to those of American Anglicans, creating tensions that may not ever be resolved. Furthermore, Pentecostalism has shot forth to become a very popular form of Christianity that allows the urban poor and illiterate to become Christian in their own right.
McGrath's goal in this work is to provide a comprehensive "grand narrative" or how Protestantism has grown and evolved over its lifetime. The concept of individual interpretation of the Bible has led to extremely disparate notions of what it says, starting out with small changes and ending up today with numerous, dramatic reformations of the essential message of the Bible. Evolution and attrition have led to wildly different views on the nature of the Bible and of Christianity, which leads to the current crises of varying perspectives being, arguably, nitpicked over and preventing discourse or unified action being taken. McGrath, being an Evangelical, takes the perspective that the focus, as it has been on the past, needs to be spreading the word of God outward instead of defending one's own perspectives5
In order for someone to parse the ideas that this work presents, one only needs to recognize the complex issues that come from permitting individualistic and personal interpretations of the Bible, and how they affect the lives of others. By inserting the ability to place one's own agenda (ostensibly) in the structure and scriptures of the Bible, one grants their agenda with a much greater sense of power. By interpreting the Bible to fit your personal beliefs, which is a very possible if not necessary extension of the pursuit of Protestantism, it is very easy to place the cultural and social power of the Bible at your command. This is what leads to irrevocable and possibly irreconcilable differences between individuals who have fundamentally different ideas of what is said in Scripture. Through the reading of this book, a Protestant can at least have a greater idea of the philosophical extension of their own beliefs, and non-Protestants can understand the global impact of the religion on many religious conflicts.
This is not to say that the idea of Protestantism has strayed from what it originally was meant to be - however, this is what McGrath seems to claim. "Protestantism has mutated over time as new forms emerged that shared a high degree of continuity - but not absolute identity - with what went before them"6. While McGrath appears careful in his claim that he is presenting an objective historical account of Protestantism's growth, the noting of personal interpretation as a "dangerous idea" gives few alternatives as to what should be done instead. McGrath tacitly blames many Christiantiy-based conflicts on the notion of Protestantism allowing any interpretation of the Bible to prevent people from reaching consensus, but never comes right out and suggests a solution to the problem. That being said, the implication is that Protestantism is to blame for at the very least enabling these conflicts through the well-meaning but "dangerous" notion of personal interpretation, a thought that is troubling and disingenuous.
In conclusion, McGrath's Christianity's Dangerous Idea provides an excellent examination of the history and evolution of Protestantism, though not without some startling and troubling implications. Beginning from its humble roots as a means to escape a feudal medieval perspective on Christianity, the Protestant Reformation led to the establishment of individual doctrines of faith that stray from the religion's origins of a healthy missionary attitude. Instead, this notion of spreading a singular word of Christianity and coming to a productive consensus of mission is hampered by the establishment of a personal truth and the defensive desire to protect it. McGrath touts this as a hazardous notion that gets in the way of progress, demonstrating the need for evangelism and active ministry in the Protestant tradition. Coming from an Evangelist author, this perspective is clear, but it is nonetheless thought-provoking. McGrath, however, also notes the strengths of Protestantism, such as its inherent malleability and its capacity to change and shift according to changing history and traditions.
Works Cited
McGrath, Alister E. Christianity's Dangerous Idea: the Protestant Revolution - a History from
the Sixteenth Century to the Twenty-First (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2007).
