Further Questions for Dispensationalists - VIII

In light of some of the content of my past few posts, I would like to present a few quotes from J. N. Darby.  Not the only voice hailing from what we refer to as the "brethren" movement, but likely the most known.  The following quotes are all taken from "The Notion of a Clergyman, dispensationally the sin against the Holy Spirit".  We must note here that, in large measure, his definition of "clergyman" was made in the historical context of a battle against "Puseyism", or "Tractarianism", which was, according to the definition given the term by Merriam-Webster, "a system of High Church principles set forth in a series of tracts at Oxford (1833-41)".  Even so, Darby is helpful in manifesting his distaste really for any form of ecclesiastical authority.

Again (to use a couple metaphors with sharp tools) I'm not trying to "grind an axe", or "bury the hatchet", but in my attempt to understand Dispensationalism more fully, I am trying to step into the shoes of those who took part in its historical development and evolution.  In the process of this research, I have seen several tangential theologies, philosophies, and practices that have caught my attention: a neglect of historical theology and its categories, a rejection of Calvinistic & and Reformed theology, and as we shall see, a general disregard for the distinction between layman and elder/pastor (to put it in the categories we recognize today).  So, if there are any dispensationalists reading this article, the questions are, what do you make of these quotes, do you think that Dispensationalism is inherently non-Calvinistic, individualistic in its polity, and largely uninterested in historical theology and its bearing on how we form our own theology?

"It is a question of the dispensational standing of the church in the world - a statement that that depends wholly on the power and presence of the Holy Ghost, and that the notion of a clergyman contradicts His title and power, on which the standing of the church down here depends. It is the habitation of God through the Spirit. Scripture is clear, that if the Gentiles do not abide in God's goodness, they will be cut off like the Jews. It equally predicts a falling away, which is not continuing in God's goodness. I believe these times are hasting greatly."

"I must be observed here to say nothing whatever against offices in the church of Christ, and the exercise of authority in them, whether episcopal or evangelical in character. It were a vain and unnecessary work here to prove the recognition of that on which scripture is so plain. But they are spoken of in Scripture as gifts derived from on high: "He gave some apostles" (Eph. 4: 5, 7, 11); so in 1 Corinthians 12, they are known only as gifts. My objection to the notion of a Clergyman is, that it substitutes something in the place of all these, which cannot be said to be of God at all, and is not found in Scripture. Now, I believe the whole principle of this to be contained in this dispensation in the word clergyman, and that this is the necessary root of that denial of the Holy Ghost which must, from the nature of the dispensation, end in its dissolution… But if clergymen have the exclusive privilege of preaching, teaching, and ministering communion, which they claim, and which is the very sense and meaning of their distinctive title, then must it be all evil. That is, the notion of a Clergyman necessarily involves the charge of evil on the work of the Holy Ghost, and therefore, I say, that the notion of a Clergyman involves the dispensation, where insisted upon, in the sin against the Holy Ghost."

"Sinners are converted to God, souls called out of darkness, the truth preached with energy and love to souls, with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, in the constraint and constancy (in whatever weakness) of the Redeemer's love: men are gathered from evil and wickedness (for I will put the fullest case my adversaries could wish) into the communion of the Lord's love, to bear witness to their sole dependence on His dying love; and this is producing confusion and schism - of which God is not the author, but Satan - because they are not, nor are brought together by, clergymen! What is this but to charge the work of divine grace with proceeding from, and having the character of, the author of evil, which is blasphemy? and this is the immediate and direct effect, the necessary effect, of the notion - the exclusive notion of a Clergyman."

"And let us for a moment look at what the word means, and we shall very remarkably find the same great characteristic mark of apostasy upon it: the substitution of a privileged order whom man owned for the Church which God owned, and the consequent depression of the Church and the despisal of the Holy Ghost in it, or blasphemy against it. What does clergy mean? It means in scripture the elect body, or rather bodies, of believers, as God's heritage, as contrasted with those who were instructors, or had spiritual oversight over them; and it is used in the place where the apostle warns such against ever assuming the place in which - in much worse than which - the ministers have now put themselves; for they are not merely lords over, but the whole cleroi themselves. The present use of the word is precisely the sign of the substitution of ministers in the place of the Church of God: as men are accustomed to speak of "going into the church." Now, all this is of the essence of apostasy: power attached to ministry, and its becoming the church in the eye of the world, so that the world can save itself the trouble of being religious by throwing it on the clergy, and so the church and the world be all one thing, and irreligious people do for the church as laity, because religion is the clergy's business, and, if theirs, nobody's (for they do not want it for irreligious laymen); and thus that which has the name of the church, being really the world, serves to exclude and set aside the operations of the Spirit of God in His children as schism and evil; and who is to decide? The church; but they are the world: and will the world ever receive the Spirit of God? It cannot. What then? They hold themselves, of course, the church; they have the clergy, which is God's church in their estimation; and the Spirit of God and His work is voted schismatic. Such is the real and simple meaning of the word clergy so used. But to produce the passage in Scripture - "Be not lords," says Peter, "over God's heritage," to the elders or instructors. That is, over God's Clergy - to give it in its English form of letters, cleroi. The bodies of Christian believers were called God's "lots" (the meaning of the original word cleros) answering to Deuteronomy 9: 29. Now the clergy have assumed to themselves to be God's lot only, but the only use of clergy in Scripture is, as applied to the laity if you please, contrasted with ministers: charging these to assume no lordship."

"The operation of the Reformation was to introduce a statement of individual faith, and to break off, generally, all without the limits of the Roman Empire, from the immediate power of Rome and Popery. It in no way separated the church from the world, but the contrary; and, while it changed the relations, left the principle of the structure just where it was. The King's Arms took the place, in the rood-loft, of the image of Christ. Christ and His Spirit ruled in neither case, save in honour. I verily believe, that the principle of a clergyman, as it is part and parcel of the structure of Popery, will reintroduce the power of Popery as far as the name of religion remains; for as it hangs on the doctrine and principle of succession, not on the presence of the Spirit, there is no ground on which a Protestant minister, as a clergyman, can prove his title, which does not validate the title of the Pope and his followers more even than his own."