CHAPTER I
EXPLANATION OF DOGMATICS (§§ 2-19)
Dogmatics is a theological discipline. Its sole use
is to serve the interest of the Christian church. This
consideration determines for us its peculiar task. Since
it presupposes the Christian church, a right apprehension of the church in general and of the character
of the Christian church in particular becomes its basis
and the touchstone of all that claims a place in it. This
being the case, we are not obliged, for example, to
derive a doctrine of God, of man, and of last things
from universal principles of reason, because these principles have no more relation to the Christian church
than to any other form of association among men;
but there are three auxiliary sciences whose aid we do
need as an introduction to dogmatics: first, ethics, because the idea of the church pertains to this realm,
since it denotes a fellowship or association which
originates and continues only through free human activities. Second, philosophy of religion, because in
defining the term church it is necessary to distinguish
the essential and permanent elements, subsisting in religious communions through all the stages of their
development, from the individual historical forms in
which their common principle may temporarily be embodied, so as to exhibit those elements as constituting
the entire manifestation of religion in human nature. 119(Compare the philosophy of law as an analogous critical discipline.) Third, apologetics, attaching itself to
the philosophy of religion in order to describe the
peculiar essence of Christianity and its relations to
other religious communions. Availing itself of propositions borrowed from these sciences, dogmatics then
proceeds to its own peculiar task, though it is to be
remembered that the value of the dogmatic does not
depend on the correctness of the processes or conclusions adopted in all or any of these three auxiliary
sciences (§ 2).
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