THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
The apostasy of the angels, the eternal duration of future punishment, the single or double procession of the Holy Spirit (the filioque clause being rejected by the Greek Church; see Filioque Controversy), may all be Scriptural doctrines, and ought to be believed, but are not fundamental doctrines of Christianity (although some would so consider the endlessness of future punishment).
The fundamental doctrines of Christianity are not to be confused with the distinctive tenets of a denomination. Denominational differences may and often do embody the truth; but the mode of baptism, for example, or the particular theory of the decrees (however valuable a right view on this subject may be as a constructive principle in dogmatic theology), or a special form of ecclesiastical polity, can not be regarded as fundamental. Christianity might not do so well with one class of opinions on these subjects (say, baptism by sprinkling, supralapsarianism, and the congregational principle of church government) as it would with another; but it would still remain radically unchanged, and continue to exert its beneficent influence.
The fundamental doctrines of Christianity are not synonymous with the doctrines essential to salvation. The latter depend upon the answer of the individual to two questions — " What think ye of Christ?" and " What must I do to be saved?" A living faith in Christ as the one sent of God for the salvation of the world is essential to salvation, and sufficient for it (John vi. 47; Acts xvi. 31). The fundamental doctrines of Christianity are broader in their scope. They concern it as an objective system of truth.
The term fundamental is not properly applied to doctrines which distinguish Christianity from natural religion. There is a distinction between the fundamentals of religion and the fundamentals of Christianity Religion is possible on the basis of the Five Articles of Lord Herbert of Cherbury; but the superstructure of the Christian religion has a different foundation. Some of the tenets which Christianity has in common with natural religion, as the existence of God, are fundamental to the former.
The Apostles' Creed, though a venerable and excellent summary of the Christian's faith, is not a perfect statement of the fundamental articles of Christianity. On the one hand, it brings out only by implication the doctrine of atonement, passes over entirely the Scriptures, and, on the other, as Waterland puts it, is " peccant in excess."
The fundamental doctrines of Christianity, then, are those which lie at the basis of the Christian system, and without which its professed aim (the glory of God and the highest welfare of man) could not, by logical necessity and with subjective certainty, be evolved. Waterland's definition is as follows: " Fundamental, as applied to Christianity, means something so necessary to its being, or at least its well-being, that it could not subsist, or maintain itself tolerably, without it " (vol. v., p. 74). And Whatever verities are found to be plainly and directly essential to the doctrine of the Gospel
3. The Fundamental Doctrines Defined Positively.
again :
covenant are fundamental " (p. 103). According to Sherlock (p. 256), they are doctrines " which are of the essence of Christianity, and without which the whole building and superstructure must fall."
The most fundamental doctrine of Christianity is salvation by Christ; and the principle will hold good that whatever doctrine stands in most necessary connection therewith is the most fundamental. The statement in Rom. i. 1-6 (the divine existence Scriptures, incarnation, grace, faith, and resurrection) approaches nearest of any passage in Scripture to a comprehensive enumeration of the fundamental doctrines. Waterland enumerated seven, as follows: (1) The Creator, or Covenanter; (2) covenant; (3) charter of the covenant, or Sacred Writ; (4) mediator; (5) repentance and a holy life; (6) sacraments; (7) two future states. The central principle from which he started was the Christian covenant. The sacraments, however, can hardly be regarded as a fundamental. The following statement is preferable: (1) The Fatherhood of God; (2) the Trinity; (3) the incarnation; (4) atonement; (5) faith or union with Christ, the condition of man's best being; (6) the immortality of the soul; (7) the Scriptures the summary of the divine purposes concerning man.
In defining what is fundamental in Christianity, it is as desirable to avoid a narrow as to avoid a latitudinarian tendency. Certain communions insist upon regarding episcopacy and the authority of the Church as fundamental. Individuals might insist upon particular views of original sin, tho divine decrees, the inspiration of the Scriptures, or the duration and nature of future punishment. But few of these are touched upon in the Apostles' Creed, and none definitely answered. Divergence of view on these points is of inconsiderable importance in comparison with the cardinal doctrines of God's existence, the Messiah's work, saving faith, the soul's immortality, and the sufficiency of Scripture for human illumination and guidance, and can not limit the perpetuity of Christianity. It is, however, not to be forgotten that a Church may profess these fundamental doctrines, and yet so combine fundamental errors as to modify, if not completely to destroy, their force. Of such errors, as held in the Roman Catholic Church, Sherlock says (p. 314) that " all the wit of man can not reconcile them with the Christian faith." On the other hand, a religious communion (as the strict Unitarians orUniversalists) may deny fundamental truths, and yet sincerely accept Christianity as the only and perfect religion, and Christ as the Lord and Savior.
The views of the school of advanced New Testament criticism represented in varying degrees of positiveness by different scholars from Harnack to Paul Wernle of Basel (Die Anfange unscrer Religion, Tubingen, 1904) attempt to retain the Christian religion as the final religion
4. Late and Christ as " the great Deliverer"
Schools from the bondage of legalism in reand ligious ritual and doctrine, and at the Theories, same time cast aside some of the evident teachings of the books of the New Testament, such as the bodily resurrection of our Lord and those doctrines which it is claimed