Fundamentals. A distinction has been drawn, both in the Roman Catholic and Protestant Churches,
between fundamental and non-fundamental articles of faith.
I. Roman theologians understand by articuli funda- mentales those doctrines which everj"^ Christian is obliged to know, to believe, and to profess, on pain of damnation ; and by articuli non-fundnmentnles sucli doctrines as a man maj' be involuntarily ignorant of, without losing the name of Christian and the hope of salvation, it being taken for granted that he would be- lieve them if made known to him by the Church. Suli- stantiallj' the Roman doctrine is that whatever the Church teaches \b fundamental.
II. In the Lutheran Church the distinction between fundamental and non-fundamental doctrines was intro- duced bj' Hunnius, and after him was further devel- oped by Quenstedt. See Hunnius, De fundamentali dissensu doctrincB Luthei'ianv et Calcinianai (1626). Ac- cording to this distinction, fundamental doctrines are those which are essential to the faith unto salvation, viz. the doctrine of Chi ist the Mediator, of the Word of God as the seed of truth, etc. The later theology has abandoned this distinction, so far as its scientific use is concerned. Practically, however, all Christians agree in considering certain doctrines as essential to the Christian sj'stem , and others as comparativeh- non- essential. See Bergier, Diet, de Theologie, s. v. Fonda- mentaux; I'e\t,Theolog. E?icyclop. art. GG; DodA,On Par- ables, i, 14; Chillingworth, Religion of Protestants, pt. i, ch.iii; Hammond, Works, vol. i ; Stillingfleet, Works, iv, 56 sq. ; Turretin, Be Artiadis Fundamentalibus, 1719. Waterland treats the subject largely in his Biscourse on Fundamentals {Works, Oxf. 1853, 6 vols., vol. V, p. 73 sq.). He remarks thatwhen we apply "the CT^ithe^t fundamental either to religion in general or to Christianity in particular, we are supposed to mean something essential to religion or Christianitj', so nec- essary to its being, or, at least, to its well-being, that it could not subsist, or maintain itself, without it." He holds that Scripture indicates this distinction of things more or less weighty : e. g. Paul, with regard to cer- tain Judaizers, exhorted his converts to bear Avith them (1 Cor. ix, 19-23), while to others he would not give place by subjection, no, not for an hour (Gal. ii, 5, 21). That the primitive Church recognised the distinc- tion he thinks has been fully shown by Spanheim, iii, 1059 ; Hoornbeck, Socin. Confut. i, 9, 210, etc. Bing- ham remarks that as to fundamental articles of faith, the Church had them always collected or summed up out of Scripture in her creeds, the profession of which was ever esteemed both necessary on tlie one hand, and sufficient on the other, in order to the admission of members into the Church by baptism ; and, conse- quently, both necessary and sufficient to keep men in the unity of the Church, so far as concerns the unity of fiiith generally required of all Christians, to make them one body and one Church of believers (Orig. Eccles. bk. xvi, ch. i). The difficulty of the subject, according to Waterland, lies not so much in deciding what is fundamental to the Christian system as such, as in deciding whether these things are to be held essen- tial in the heViei of particular jjersons in order to their salvation. The former are as fixed as Christianity itself; the latter will always vary with the capacities and opportunities of the persons themselves. So the terms of communion may be one thing, the terms of salvation another. Herein Roman Catliolic theology differs from Protestant, as it makes the terms of com- munion identical with the terms of salvation. Jona- than Edwards cites Stapfer to the same purport: "On account of the various degrees of men's capacities, and the various circumstances of the times in which thej' lived, one man may know truths which another cannot know. Whence it follows that the very same articles .■■re not fundamental to all men; but, accordingly as revelation hath been more or less complete, according to the several dispensations under which men have lived, their various natural abilities, and their various
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modes of circumstances of living, different articles are, | Christ being the onh' God and man in one person, re- and have been, fundamental to different men. This is mains forever a distinct person from all saints and an- verj' plain from the different degrees of knowledge be- gels, notwithstanding their union and communion witli fore and since the coming of Christ, for before his com- him. 12. That all men by nature are dead in sins and ing many truths were hid wliich are now set in the trespasses ; and no man can be saved unless he be born most clear light; and the instance of the apostles ' again, repent, and believe. 13. That we arc jiu titled abundantly shows the truth of what I have now ad- and saved by grace and faith in Jesus Christ, ;.nd not vanced, who, although they were already in a state of j by works. 14. That to continue in any known sin, grace, and their salvation was secured, yet for some ' upon what pretence or principle soever, is d; mnable. time were ignorant of the necessity of the suffering 15. That God is to be worshipped according to his own and death of Christ, and of the true nature of his king- : will; and whosoever shall forsake and despise all the doni ; whereas he who now does not ackowledge, or | duties of his worship, cannot be saved. IG. That the perhaps denies, the necessity of Christ's death, is b}' j dead shall rise ; and that there is a day of judgment,