Given the rather haughty discussions regularly found on a variety of forums about Albert Outler’s try at a metaphorical description of John Wesley’s theological method, I could not help but chuckle as I re-read his signature essay, The Wesleyan Quadrilateral – in John Wesley. Just before the final part of his essay, Outler writes the following.
The term “quadrilateral” does not occur in the Wesley corpus—and more than once, I have regretted having coined it for contemporary use, since it has been so widely misconstrued.
While he regrets the way people have made Wesley’s remarkably complex approach so simplistic, at the same time he clearly believes that the more nuanced analysis of Wesley’s approach that he describes, rather than shallow slogans, can contribute to both the broad ecumenical (and I would suggest multi-faith) conversations of which we are regularly a part and the ongoing struggle to include helpful evangelical voices into the “big tent” reality of our current denomination as it matures. Again, Outler writes:
But if we are to accept our responsibility for seeking intellecta for our faith, in any other fashion than a “theological system” or, alternatively, a juridical statement of “doctrinal standards,” then this method of a conjoint recourse to the fourfold guidelines of Scripture, tradition, reason and experience, may hold more promise for an evangelical and ecumenical future than we have realized as yet—by comparison, for example, with biblicism, or traditionalism, or, rationalism, or empiricism. It is far more valid than the reduction of Christian authority to the dyad of “Scripture” and “experience” (so common in Methodist ranks today). The “quadrilateral” requires of a theologian no more than what he or she might reasonably be held accountable for: which is to say, a familiarity with Scripture that is both critical and faithful; plus, an acquaintance with the wisdom of the Christian past; plus, a taste for logical analysis as something more than a debater’s weapon; plus, a vital, inward faith that is upheld by the assurance of grace and its prospective triumphs, in this life.
Sometimes it takes thinking outside of the box, moving beyond the traditional lines, or what other image you prefer to describe finding a solution that is more both/and than either/or. It seems to me that there are several issues facing the United Methodist church that make the creation of alternate solutions imperative if we are going to maintain our unity (and effectiveness) as a denomination.
One might think that the so-called Wesleyan quadrilateral would not be too controversial. Think again, for the stated understandings of the relationships between the component parts are significant when it comes doing theology in the Methodist movement.
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Outler celebrates the radically new edge Wesley brings to the task of theology in each generation. The effect of Wesley’s new approach…
….was to put the question of authority into a new context: to relate it more nearly to the individual’s conscience, to small group consensus, and also to link it practically with the ideal of “accountable discipleship,” (to use an apt phrase of David Watson’s). The practical effect of this was to make every Methodist man and woman his / her own theologian.[emphasis mine] He nowhere gave his people an actual paradigm for their theologizing; somehow, he hoped that they would adopt his ways of reflection as their own.
For Outler, we must in a certain sense start again.
The truth is, however, that his bare texts, unannotated, did not suffice to make true “Wesleyans” out of those who have continued to bear his name and who honor him as patriarch. This is why the editors of the new edition of his Works hope that more ample annotations will help both “Wesleyans” and non-Wesleyans in the “discovery” of the richness and sophistication of his special sort of “folk theology.”
I might also remind you of the recent publication of the new Wesley Study Bible. Outler continues:
Even that cheerful thought may be thwarted, however, so long as the phrase “the Wesleyan quadrilateral” is taken too literally. It was intended as a metaphor for a four element syndrome, including the four-fold guidelines of authority in Wesley’s theological method. In such a quaternity, Holy Scripture is clearly unique. But this in turn is illuminated by the collective Christian wisdom of other ages and cultures between the Apostolic Age and our own. It also allows for the rescue of the Gospel from obscurantism by means of the disciplines of critical reason. But always, Biblical revelation must be received in the heart by faith: this is the requirement of “experience.” Wesley’s theology was eclectic and pluralistic (and I confess my bafflement at the hostility aroused in some minds by such innocent adjectives). Even so, it was a coherent, stable, whole, deriving its fruitfulness from its single, soteriological focus in the Christian evangel of Jesus Christ—”who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven and was made man!”
I want to come back in another discussion to the notion of a central narrative and maybe whether there might be a problem with the overall hegemony of just one myth. In that context, we might ask whether in our more pluralistic experience, we might see other narratives as central to the gospel as well.
For the moment however, I think it may be the time to move beyond Outler’s initial metaphor to a deeper image more in keeping with the Wesleyan heritage that Outler himself describes.
Geometry defines a quadrilateral as a four-sided figure with parallel lines – a square, a rectangle, perhaps a parallelogram. Metaphorically, it can suggest a table. In the center is some doctrinal issue and four resources are brought to bear on the discussion. While Outler reminds us that for Wesley scripture is primary i.e. the place one starts, if one reads Outler closely it becomes obvious that this phrase has been hijacked by fundamentalists and extreme evangelicals who try to put a happy face on fundamentalism. Instead of a shared table, we are left with what might be pictured as a three-legged stool with the three legs – tradition, reason and experience primarily supporting the really important source, the real “Word of God.”
I want to drop a different image into the discussion daring to suggest that it might be more helpful than the metaphor of the quadrilateral. I still learning to make my own images, but here goes. Don’t take the titles to seriously.
So for me, rather than four distinct sides, I want to suggest that we begin to imagine two sets of bi-polar dynamics – one holding the tension between canonical tradition (scripture) and the larger received wisdom (tradition) of those who have gone before. The second dynamic represents the creative human response that dialogues with the first and represents the human response to the received heritage that holds the tension between radical experience of grace and the rational description of that experience. Such a model allows for reflection on the consequences of the breakdown of these tensions reducing the constituent parts to caricatures of what they represent – so loyalty to scripture is tempted to fall into idolatry, authentic obedience to tradition becomes authoritarianism, experience become enthusiasm, and reason become simplistic abstraction.
Also, I’d kind of like to play with the quadrants suggested by the model as well. What would it look like to plot our denominations on the diagram? I’d put the Baptists somewhere around the intersection of scripture and experience. My congregation might be most comfortable falling between tradition and reason.
Anyway, I’ll stop here. What do you think?
Before I go, I’ll close with one more quote from Outler, encouraging you to read the whole essay so that it might inform our discussion.
Neither the Wesley theology, nor his methods are simple panaceas. They are not like the TV dinners that can be reheated and served up quickly for immediate use. They call for imaginative updating in the new world cultural contexts (the sort of thing that John XXIII spoke of as aggiornamento—care in preserving the kernel, imagination in renovating the medium). Wesley’s vision of Christian existence has to be reconceived and transvalued so that it can be as relevant in the experience of the late 20th century as it was to alienated English men and women in 1740! This requires that it must be refocused in ways neither doctrinaire on the one hand, nor trendy on the other. Wesley avoided such barren polarizations and so, one thinks, we may also—if our theologians, like his, are as deeply immersed in Scripture (“at home” in its imagery and mystery), as truly respectful of the Christian wisdom of past ages, as honestly open to the disciplines of critical reason, as eagerly alert to the fire and flame of grace.
Peace, Shalom and Salaam
John
