PE180
New Horizons (April, 1994) © Covenant Media Foundation, 800/553-3938

What Is "Theonomy"?
By Dr. Greg Bahnsen

1. Jesus My Savior
2. Jesus My Lord
3. Covenant Theology
4. King of Kings

Am I A "Theonomist?"
Kevin Craig

1. Torah in Our Hearts
2. Dietary Laws
3. Mathew 5:17-20 - "Fulfilled"
4. Anarcho-Theonomy
5. Theonomic Oligarchy
6. Further Reading
7. About the Author

1. The Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are, in part and in whole, a verbal revelation from God through the words of men, being infallibly true regarding all that they teach on any subject.

See #4 below.

Jesus My Savior

2. Since the Fall it has always been unlawful to use the law of God in hopes of establishing one's own personal merit and justification, in contrast or complement to salvation by way of promise and faith; commitment to obedience is but the lifestyle of faith, a token of gratitude for God's redeeming grace.

Jesus My Lord

On a recent podcast, J.D. Hall criticized R.J. Rushdoony's slogan, “Justification is by grace through faith; sanctification is by law.” I'll take the bait: check this out. Rushdoony's slogan seems to be Hodge's as well.

3. The word of the Lord is the sole, supreme, and unchallengeable standard for the actions and attitudes of all men in all areas of life; this word naturally includes God's moral directives (law).

4. Our obligation to keep the law of God cannot be judged by any extrascriptural standard, such as whether its specific requirements (when properly interpreted) are congenial to past traditions or modern feelings and practices.

Notice what these principles tell us about the theological and moral character of theonomic ethics. The foundational authority of scripture (#1) and the precious truth of salvation by grace alone (#2) provide the context within which every other theonomic thesis is developed and understood. "Theonomic" ethics is committed to developing an overall Christian world-and-life-view (#3) according to the regulating principle of sola Scriptura (#4) and the hermeneutic of covenant theology (#5). The new and better covenant established by Christ does offer Biblical warrant for recognizing changes in covenantal administration (#6), but not changes in moral standards, lest the divinely revealed ethic be reduced to situationism or relativism -- just one tribal perspective among many in the evolutionary history of ethics (#7). Righteousness and justice, according to Biblical teaching, have a universal character, precluding any double-standard of morality.

Covenant Theology

Jeremiah 31:33

But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my torah in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

This passage is quoted by the writer to the Hebrews:

⁸ For finding fault with them, He says,

When Jeremiah prophesied these words, he said God would write His TORAH on the hearts of Christians. Not just so that we would have them memorized, but that we would obey them. How do you think the Hebrews of Jeremiah's day understood this prophecy? Theonomic? How do you think the Hebrews of Jesus' day understood this letter quoting Jeremiah? A repudiation of Jeremiah's Theonomy, or a strengthening of it? Jeremiah's thought is also seen in the prophet Ezekiel:

The Prophets of the New Covenant were Theonomic.

6. In regard to the Old Testament law, the New Covenant surpasses the Old Covenant in glory, power, and finality (thus reinforcing former duties). The New Covenant also supersedes the Old Covenant shadows, thereby changing the application of sacrificial, purity, and "separation" principles, redefining the people of God, and altering the significance of the promised land.

Controversy!

Bahnsen says "no more animal sacrifices," but that doesn't comfort many anti-Theonomists. He says the dietary laws are out, but that's not good enough for them. Rushdoony and Bahnsen did not agree on the issue of the dietary laws. Some Theonomists still observe them. So some anti-theonomists accuse [all] Theonomists of being "judaizers." On a recent podcast, J.D. Hall accused Rushdoony of being a "Judaizer," and guilty of "the Galatian heresy." I wonder which is worse, being a "Judaizer" or calling down God's "Anathema" on a Godly Christian man like Rushdoony.

I personally think there is good reason to continue observing the dietary laws. Contrary to Bahnsen's claim, it is not inescapably correct to say that "clean" and "unclean" symbolize the difference between "Jew" and "Gentile," because the clean/unclean categories existed in Noah's day -- before there was "Jew" and "Gentile" -- and still exist (in some sense) in the Apostolic age (verses). Read more.

Was Rushdoony therefore not a "real" Theonomist because he disagreed with Bahnsen on the issue of the dietary laws? Or vice versa? No, because both believed that it was the Bible itself that must tell us what "Theonomy" really is, not theories of "natural law," and we'll have disagreements about what the Bible says, but we'll work through them like Bereans.

Unfortunately Theonomists disagree among themselves, and anti-Theonomists call Theonomists "dangerous," and there's not a lot of Scripture-searching, like the Bereans.

"Better safe than sorry," I say. It's obvious to me that after Christ shed His blood, shedding any other blood in an attempt to propitiate the wrath of God is a bad idea. Mixing wool and linen? Maybe there's something to that. If it's still a good idea to "Honor your father and mother" (Ephesians 6:1-3), maybe it's a good idea to ask some questions about the creatures that go along the bottom of the water cleaning up after other fish (if you catch my drift). God isn't arbitrary or stupid.

Matthew 5:17-20 (KJV)

17 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to πληρῶσαι.
18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be γένηται.

There's a lot of heated debate about the meaning of those two Greek words. What do they mean? You don't have to know Greek to figure it out. What Jesus is saying is that He came to create conditions in which the follower of Christ is committed to obeying the law and the prophets, and teaching others to obey them as well. Some anti-theonomists claim that Jesus "fulfilled" God's Law for us, therefore we don't have to keep it (compare Hodge above). Sounds like the Pharisees, who said it was enough to keep their own man-made traditions instead of God's Law. The next verse makes clear what the Greek words mean:

19 Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

"Doing" and "teaching" are not things Jesus came to destroy or to abrogate. He came to fulfill the prophecies of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, of making a people for Himself that would be heartfelt Theonomists.

I've heard J.D. Hall on more than one video describe Bahnsen's exposition of Matthew 5:17-19 in Theonomy in Christian Ethics as taking up "half the book."  If you have your copy of the book, place one finger at page 39, where Bahnsen begins his exposition of Matthew 5:17-19, and another finger at page 86, where he finishes looking at that passage. Hold all those pages between your thumb and index finger. Does it look like "half the book?" Maybe it seems like "half the book" to anti-theonomists because Bahnsen put lotsa Greek stuff in that chapter. And they probably didn't read the other "half" either.

Many people think that Theonomists are "Pharisees" and "legalists." But Jesus says His disciples are more righteous than those who use God's Word for their own selfish purposes:

20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven

The religious leaders of Jesus' day were "hypocrites," as Jesus repeatedly said. Outwardly they postured as Theonomists, but they were actually committed to evading God's Law, not putting it into practice. The legalistic religious leaders were the enemies of God and the enemies of Theonomy:

Mark 7

⁵ Then the Pharisees and scribes asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat bread with unwashed hands?”

⁶ He answered and said to them, “Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:

         ‘This people honors Me with their lips,
         But their heart is far from Me.
         ⁷ And in vain they worship Me,
         Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

⁸ For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men —the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.”

⁹ He said to them, “All too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition.¹⁰ For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.’ ¹¹ But you say, ‘If a man says to his father or mother, “Whatever profit you might have received from me is Corban”—’ (that is, a gift to God), ¹² then you no longer let him do anything for his father or his mother, ¹³ making the word of God of no effect through your tradition which you have handed down. And many such things you do.”

Theonomists are not Pharisees. Theonomists are "Bibliolators." They are the New Covenant believers Jeremiah and Ezekiel described.

King of Kings

He shall judge among many people,
and rebuke strong nations afar off;
Micah 4:3

His Word "rebukes" kings now. Presidents, Prime Ministers, and Dictators only wish that this rebuking did not begin until after His Second Coming.

5. We should presume that Old Testament standing laws[note26] continue to be morally binding in the New Testament, unless they are rescinded or modified by further revelation.[note27]

26. Standing law" is used here for policy directives applicable over time to classes of individuals (e.g., do not kill; children, obey your parents; merchants, have equal measures; magistrates, execute rapists), in contrast to particular directions for an individual (e.g., the order for Samuel to anoint David at a particular time and place) or positive commands for distinct incidents (e.g., God's order for Israel to exterminate certain Canaanite tribes at a certain point in history).

27. By contrast, it is characteristic of dispensational theology to hold that Old Covenant commandments should be a priori deemed as abrogated - unless repeated in the New Testament (e.g., Charles Ryrie, "The End of the Law," Bibliotheca Sacra, vol. 124 [1967], pp. 239-242).

7. God's revealed standing laws are a reflection of His immutable moral character and, as such, are absolute in the sense of being non-arbitrary, objective, universal, and established in advance of particular circumstances (thus applicable to general types of moral situations).
8. Christian involvement in politics calls for recognition of God's transcendent, absolute, revealed law as a standard by which to judge all social codes.
9. Civil magistrates in all ages and places are obligated to conduct their offices as ministers of God, avenging divine wrath against criminals and giving an account on the Final Day of their service before the King of kings, their Creator and Judge.
10. The general continuity which we presume with respect to the moral standards of the Old Testament applies just as legitimately to matters of socio-political ethics as it does to personal, family, or ecclesiastical ethics.
11. The civil precepts of the Old Testament (standing 'judicial" laws) are a model of perfect social justice for all cultures, even in the punishment of criminals. Outside of those areas where God's law prescribes their intervention and application of penal redress, civil rulers are not authorized to legislate or use coercion (e.g., the economic marketplace).
12. The morally proper way for Christians to correct social evils which are not under the lawful jurisdiction of the state is by means of voluntary and charitable enterprises or the censures of the home, church, and marketplace - even as the appropriate method for changing the political order of civil law is not violent revolution, but dependence upon regeneration, re-education, and gradual legal reform.

"Theonomic" ethics likewise rejects legal positivism and maintains that there is a "law above the (civil) law" to which appeal can be made against the tyranny of rulers and the anarchy of overzealous reformers alike (#9). Since Jesus Christ is Lord over all (cf. #3), civil magistrates are His servants and owe obedience to His revealed standards for them (#9). There is no Biblically based justification (cf. #5) for exempting civil authorities from responsibility to the universal standards of justice (cf. #7) found in God's Old Testament revelation (#10). Therefore, in the absence of Biblically grounded argumentation which releases the civil magistrate from Old Testament social norms (cf. #5, #6), it follows from our previous premises that in the exercise of their offices rulers are morally responsible to obey the revealed standards of social justice in the Old Testament law (#11). This does not mean, however, that civil rulers have unlimited authority to intrude just anywhere into the affairs of men and societies (# 11 #12); their legitimate sphere is restricted to what God's word has authorized them to do -- thus calling for a limited role for civil government. Finally, Christians are urged to use persuasive and "democratic" means of social reform - nothing like the strong-arm tactics slanderously attributed to the theonomic program (#12).[note28]

28. For example, the main thrust of a widely read article on theonomic ethics by Rodney Clapp in Christianity Today, vol. 31, no. 3 (Feb. 20, 1987), was captured in its title: "Democracy as Heresy." He recklessly accuses theonomists of seeking "the abolition of democracy" (p. 17), when surely Clapp is aware that the word 'democracy' is susceptible to an incredibly wide range of definitions and connotations (e.g., from an institution of direct rule by every citizen without mediating representatives to a governmental procedure where representatives are voted in and out of office by the people, to the simple concepts of majority vote or social equality, etc.). Theonomists are opposed to some of those ideas, but surely not to what is commonly understood by the word: namely, democratic procedures for choosing representatives to rule. Indeed, in reply to Mr. Clapp's inflammatory rhetoric, Dr. Gary North very appropriately pointed out as a historian the irony that it was precisely our Puritan (and theonomic) forefathers who fought for and established this kind of "democracy" in the Western world!

Anarcho-Theonomy

An updated version of this section is found here: www.Anarcho-Theonomy.com

Bahnsen says entities calling themselves "the State" or "the government" or "the civil magistrate" are obligated to follow God's Commandments in the Scriptures (including commandments in "The Law and the Prophets"). I agree. I also believe entities calling themselves "La Cosa Nostra" ("Our Thing"), "Yakuza," "Solntsevskaya Bratva" ("Russian Mafia"), "Sinaloa Cartel," or any of dozens of other similar criminal entities, are also morally obligated to follow God's Commandments in the Old Testament.

"It is the duty of nations, as subjects of Christ, to take His law as their rule. They are apt to think enough that they take, as their standard of legislation and administration, human reason, natural conscience, public opinion or political expediency. None of these, however, nor indeed all of them together, can supply a sufficient guide in affairs of state"
(Messiah the Prince, p. 234).

• Christian Anarchism in a Nutshell

God created human beings in a social form we would call "Patriarchy." When Noah got off the ark with his family, all human beings existed in a state of "Patriarchy." Abraham the Patriarch had perhaps thousands of people in his family as a result of evangelism, domestic apprenticeship, job-creation, charity, and home-church. Romans 13, a much-misunderstood passage, prohibits Christians from violently resisting demonic empires, but does not condone imperial conquest and plunder of the weak by the strong.

• Romans 13: A Christian Anarchist Perspective

Jesus prohibits His followers from being "archists" (Mark 10:42-45), which logically means Christians, while orderly and peaceful at all times, are technically "an-archists."

• I Am Not an ARCHIST
• How To Become a Christian Anarchist

I feel that Christians who are not Theonomists let the State off the hook.

Theonomic Oligarchy?

I agree that everyone -- civil magistrates, mafia hit-men, prostitutes -- are obligated to submit to Christ by obeying His inscriptured Word. I worry that many Theonomists envision little more than a "Theonomic Oligarchy" in which a small plurality of Theonomic activists elect a slate of "Theonomic candidates" to political office to execute the unrepentant demographic. This, I guess, would be an "amillennial Theonomy," whereas a more robust "Postmillennial Theonomy" would come closer to the Biblical vision of the knowledge of the Lord covering the earth as the waters cover the sea, resulting in widespread conversion, repentance, obedience, and cultural sanctification, rather than a more pessimillennial theocratic whack-a-mole. (I also consider myself a "Theocrat.")

     For the most orthodox of Theonomic reasons, I believe "capital punishment" -- a liturgical shedding of blood -- was a "ceremonial" law, and is therefore abolished. For all crimes.
     I don't consider "restitution" a "punishment." When one repents, one has a duty to undo the damage done by his sin. The duty stands even in the absence of socialism, fascism, or any other form of "the State."
     In any case, "capital punishment" -- the ultimate power -- was given to "Noah and his sons" (Genesis 9) and can be administered without an institution we call "the State." Christians should voluntarily form dispute resolution organizations. As Christians gain social influence, even the unconverted will feign Theonomic obedience and come under the market institutions and social order of a global Christocracy.

It may seem like "Theonomy" is all about politics. This should not be the case. The bulk of Bahnsen's lengthy treatise on Theonomy does not discuss politics, but only the basic concept of the abiding validity of the Old Testament generally. More specifically, the book deals with the basic objections to God's commanding us at all, which are often the "Law vs. Grace" or "Law vs. Gospel" objections. This is really the heart of most objections to Theonomy. That and executing adulterers.

Bahnsen's particular application of Theonomy to the State is not the Theonomic thesis itself, but only an "application of the thesis." Ditto for applications made by R.J. Rushdoony and Gary North. Indeed, the section which does address politics is called "Application of the Thesis to the State" (p. 315).

Bahnsen writes in his summary volume, By This Standard: The Authority of God's Law Today,

[T]hose who agree with the foundational conclusion of [Theonomy] -- that God's Law is binding today unless Scripture reveals otherwise -- may very well disagree among themselves over particular matters in interpreting what God's law demands at this or that point, or ... may disagree over how these demands should be followed today (p. 9).

Leaders of the "Christian Reconstruction" movement have had their disagreements on the application of the Theonomic thesis. Rushdoony and North disagreed to such an extent that they weren't even talking to each other! Bahnsen disagreed with Rushdoony on several issues, as we've noted. Based on the Theonomic thesis, I personally do not believe in "capital punishment" for any crime. That might surprise many opponents of Theonomy, who assume that "Theonomy" means nothing if not the execution of homosexuals and adulterers.

"Theonomy" means God has the right to command man. It does not mean "the State" does.

Summary

God created human beings in a Family. The institution of a priesthood was temporary. The creation of "the State" was an act of rebellion against God's Law. That means society should be a patriarchal (family-centered) Christocracy.

John M. Frame's Theory of the State: An Anarchist Salute -- Contains a brief overview of the "Vine & Fig Tree" vision of Anarcho-Theocracy.