The New Fundamentalism

Last updated on: August 18, 2011 at 7:28 pm by Roger E. Olson

The New Fundamentalism 2011-08-18T19:28:00-05:00 Roger E. Olson

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Several have asked me here to explain my meaning of “fundamentalism.” That’s difficult to do in a nutshell. Like “evangelicalism” one has to distinguish between the Fundamentalist Movement (or “movement fundamentalism”) and the fundamentalist ethos.

The Fundamentalist Movement is well understood; scholars such as Marsden and Carpenter have recounted its history and distinguishing features. I have interacted with movement fundamentalists over the years by having them visit my classes. One of those speakers (from Central Baptist Theological Seminary in Minneapolis) emphasized that fundamentalism is marked off from other types of Christianity (including neo-evangelicalism) by its militant (not violent) defense of biblical orthodoxy and its doctrine and practice of biblical separation including secondary separation.

The Fundamentalist Movement, in spite of itself, has no definite boundaries because it is a movement and not an organization. It includes organizations such as the American Council of Christian Churches founded by Carl McIntire which became an evangelical rival on the right to the National Association of Evangelicals.

Billy Graham started out in this Fundamentalist Movement but was ostracized from it because of his inclusion of Catholics and “liberal” Protestants in his New York evangelistic crusade in the late 1940s. (All of this is described in detail by Marsden and Carpenter in their books to which I have alluded several times before. Look them up on amazon.com.)

Harold John Ockenga’s “new evangelicalism” emerged out of the Fundamentalist Movement in the 1940s and 1950s. The major differences had to do with cultural engagement (as opposed to separation), a broader perspective on who is evangelical (Ockenga and the NAE included Pentecostals), a greater emphasis on the good of education (even outside of fundamentalist Bible institutions) and an attempt to rebalance the Christian beliefs that properly belong in the “essential” and “non-essential” categories. (Many in the Fundamentalist Movement had come to view premillennialism as an essential of Christian faith.)

The NAE’s statement of faith illustrates well the shift: It does not include the inerrancy of Scripture (although it does use the term infallible for the Bible) or the substitutionary atonement (it says “vicarious sacrifice) or premillennialism.

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s and into the 1970s the new evangelicalism, largely focused on Billy Graham and his ministries (including Christianity Today), and the Fundamentalist Movement went their separate ways with occasional clashes. Both sides took delight in criticizing the other side. Fundamentalists criticized the new evangelicals for being “compromised” (with secular culture and liberal theology) and for seeking respectability. The new evangelicals criticized movement fundamentalists for being narrow minded, anti-intellectual, too separatistic and for majoring in the minors of doctrine and practice.

To make a long story short, during the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s movement fundamentalists such as Jerry Falwell began to call themselves “evangelicals” and the media began to call them that (much to the chagrin of some movement fundamentalists and some new evangelicals). Billy Graham began to decline as the glue holding the new evangelicalism together. The NAE’s influence began to wane. Fundamentalism began to bleed out of its normal zone of separatistic isolation into culture and into evangelicalism. Many conservative evangelicals began to sound more and more like fundamentalists.

One major turning point in this blurring of traditional differences between movement fundamentalism and the new evangelicalism was Harold Lindsell’s 1976 book The Battle for the Bible that fell like a bombshell on the playground of the evangelicals. It argued that biblical inerrancy (rather narrowly defined) is an essential of evangelical faith if not of Christianity itself. Even Carl F. H. Henry, the “dean” of the new evangelical theologians, disagreed and was dropped as a columnist from Christianity Today. (Henry had been the founding editor of CT; Lindsell was one of his successors.)

However, numerous evangelical pastors, denominational leaders, parachurch organization leaders and administrators of evangelical colleges, universities and seminaries either agreed with Lindsell or were cowed into seeming to agree with him by pressure from constituents.

A personal, illustrative anecdote. When I enrolled in an evangelical seminary in 1975 it did not have a statement on inerrancy and, to the best of my knowledge, none of the faculty believed in biblical inerrancy. They talked about biblical infallibility but distinguished that from inerrancy. They talked about inerrancy as a fundamentalist view of the Bible and preferred to adhere to the Bible’s full authority for faith and practice. This was a mainstream evangelical seminary, not at all to the “left” or influenced by liberalism. It did have a Pietist background, however, which inclined it toward a more generous orthodoxy (not a term coined by McLaren!).

After The Battle for the Bible was published, while I was still in seminary, the denomination’s pastors pressured the seminary to adopt a binding statement of the Bible’s inerrancy in the original autographs. The faculty were asked to sign it. I noticed that several of my professors who had criticized inerrancy in class signed it to keep their jobs. One resigned and went on to a stellar career in American and Canadian Baptist seminaries. The ethos of the seminary changed. A chill came over the classrooms and student-faculty lounge and chapel. At my graduation a fundamentalist pastor and radio preacher delivered the commencement address, much to the chagrin of most of the faculty and students.

It isn’t so much that movement fundamentalists switched sides or joined new evangelical organizations. It’s that some among the new evangelicals began to sympathize with SOME features of fundamentalism and regret evangelicalism’s movement away from it.

The Fundamentalist Movement still exists in relatively clear distinction from the post-WW2, postfundamentalist evangelical movement. The distinction still has to do with separationism and especially secondary separation. Even the most conservative, neo-fundamentalist evangelicals rarely practice secondary separation. Billy Graham is still their hero and they claim him even if some of his specific views are not popular among them.

However, what I call a fundamentalist ethos has bled out of movement fundamentalism and begun to have a pernicious influence among people who are heirs of the original postfundamentalist evangelical founders and leaders. I call this “neo-fundamentalism.” It is beginning to coalesce as a distinct movement within evangelicalism and is attempting to take over the entire evangelical movement (as it did the Southern Baptist Convention).

What are the distinguishing features of neo-fundamentalism?

First, a certain militancy in defense of perceived evangelical doctrinal tradition. Self-appointed spokespersons for neo-fundamentalism are actively seeking to get those evangelicals they consider doctrinally impure or compromised fired from evangelical organizations and not published by evangelical publishers. They congratulate each other and give each other pats on the back for pointing out heresy or heterodoxy where it has not yet been recognized. Their practice of theology is almost exclusively critical; they see no value in constructive or reconstructive theology even if it is based on fresh and faithful biblical research. They are militant defenders and promoters of something they call “the received evangelical tradition” (or by another name).

Second, a certain mean-spiritedness toward fellow evangelicals who disagree with them. Many of these neo-evangelicals see nothing wrong with misrepresenting their opponents’ views in order to marginalize them. (I have myself been subjected to this frequently and could cite names, but that’s not my goal here.) One well-known and highly regarded neo-fundamentalist evangelical theologian tried to get a colleague fired for allegedly not believing rightly in the resurrection. (According to him it has to be “physical,” “bodily” is not enough.) The same man wrote a book claiming that open theism borrows from process theology and cited pages in an open theists’ book to prove it. Anyone who looked up those pages could easily see the open theist author denied influence by process theology while only admitting similarity on one point–God’s knowledge of the future.

Third, a tendency to fill up the “essentials” (dogmas) category of Christian beliefs with non-essentials. For example, many neo-fundamentalists are claiming that substitutionary atonement is an essential of Christian faith. Even the NAE statement of faith doesn’t mention it! Some are claiming that inclusivism is in direct conflict with basic Christian doctrine. (They conveniently overlook that C. S. Lewis was an inclusivist as is Billy Graham.) I could go on mentioning secondary doctrines that neo-fundamentalists within the evangelical movement are contending for in a somewhat militant manner even to the point of questioning the salvation of those who do not believe them.

Fourth, a new version of separationism. Neo-fundamentalists don’t often practice secondary separation. But it is beginning to raise its ugly head among them. One example is the Southern Baptist Convention’s withdrawal from the World Baptist Alliance. Neo-fundamentalists are doing their best to take over organizations traditionally related to the broader “new evangelicalism” movement, but when they can’t, they are beginning to found their own separate organizations to compete with evangelical ones.

What I see emerging, that in my opinion is not being recognized by most evangelical leaders, is a third way–a via media between movement fundamentalism and the postfundamentalist evangelicalism. People from movement fundamentalism are emerging out of their isolation into this third way and calling it “conservative evangelicalism.” People from postfundamentalist evangelicalism are adopting this third way and calling it “conservative evangelicalism.” THIS is why I call myself a postconservative evangelical. It has NOTHING to do with being liberal; it has everything to do with not wanting to be confused with these people creating and populating this third way via media. I simply refuse to give up the label “evangelical,” but because of the growing influence of this third way I have to use some adjective to distinguish my own way of being evangelical from that.

More to come….

Uncategorized

Previous Post

March 23, 2011

My letter to First Things (responding to the McDermott article)

Next Post

March 25, 2011 The Promised Response to Bell's Love Wins

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Against Liberal Theology Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Great is your faithfulness! Your mercies are new every what?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Season Day Hour Morning