DOGMA, DOGMATIC THEOLOGY. Theology, like political economy, has no technical terminology, but seeks to use the language of ordinary life in a specialized sense. Colloquially, to assert dogmatically is contrasted with speaking tentatively. But also, dogmatism is contrasted with proof. "I'm not arguing with you, I'm telling you"—he who so speaks is, reasonably or unrea sonably, dogmatic. The claim of accuracy akin to that of science and of authoritativeness akin to that of law, are the two poles of the universe of dogma. In the New Testament the word. means decree, although the Greek fathers early misunderstood it. The older philosophical use, for the leading and inviolate principles of any system, is best illustrated by the Ipse dixit of the Pythago reans; whatever their master had said was final. German theolo gians have sought to define the word for their own purpose by drawing a line round those doctrines which deserve to be called dogmas and by separating them from the region of open questions. According to W. Herrmann (opening p. of Dogmatik in Die Kultur der Gegenwart), "We must not mainly understand by a 'Dogma' a definition upon Church authority. Such a definition is only the last stage in a long process, which has all along been actuated by the thought of a revealed doctrine. And that con ception is the main element in 'Dogma.' " In contrast with this F. Loofs (Leitfaden zum Studium der Dogmengeschichte, ed. 4, , p. 9) holds that "Dogmas are those affirmations of religious faith whose acknowledgment a Church expressly requires from its members or at least from its teachers." Harnack in his great His tory of Dognza prefers a more historical definition. Dogma is (I) a creation of Greek thought on the soil of the gospel and (2) kindred mediaeval findings, but (3) it is transformed or dis appears in Protestantism through deepening religious insight, in Socinianism and the Enlightenment through the dominance of rationalism, in the post-Tridentine church through more sweeping exercise of authority. Each of these definitions has its merits. Something is to be said also for the view that, in the modern Church of Rome, we have dogmatism superlatively developed— partly just because that Church forbids one to draw a hard and fast line separating dogmas from pious opinions, or formulated dogmas from unformulated; all the Church's teaching being in fallibly and dogmatically true. The choice of a definition can only be made by balancing advantages against disadvantages.
As to dogmatic theology, all that need be said is that it is the most widely accepted narpe for the systematic statement of Chris tian doctrines—and not merely of dogmas, if dogmas are to be separated off from the floating mass of theories.
When the Church inherited the Jewish scriptures, it took over an instalment of dogma, and one beset for it by special difficulties too little recognized by theologians—a book holy and divine, and yet not the perfect revelation of God! When, in controversy with Gnosticism, a collection of New Testament writings was added to the "Old Testament," the inheritance grew; and the dogmatic postulate, that all scriptures contain the same teaching, became no easier to vindicate. One cannot deny that Calvinism in the past or that Fundamentalism in the present is in a very high degree dogmatic. For each of these, the corpus of scripture is the sum total of dogma; and to the scripture every thought of man is to bow. The Catholic ethos adds other things—an em phasis on sacraments; a gathering up of the contents of the Bible (with unconfessed modifications) into creeds; a franker announce ment of church authority. In these features of Catholicism there appears to be a fuller realization of the dogmatic temper than where appeal is made to the Bible alone.
Harnack has good reason for insisting on the fundamental im portance of the great Eastern dogmas, Trinity and Incarnation. These expressed the piety of Eastern Catholicism; and they passed into the mediaeval West and even into historic Protestant ism as presuppositions—only presuppositions, but as such indis pensable. And yet, in their original shaping, the West had played no small part, when curiously hard questions were raised by the East. It has been felicitously observed that "the East thought that everything could be explained; and the West, that nothing needed to be explained." Even at the first General Council (Nicea, 325) it appears certain that Western minds brushed aside Eastern scruples in imposing the watchword "homoousios"—a term with questionable associations, but a term which not even the slipperiness of the Arians could evade. So again, at Chalcedon (451) and at the First Trullan Council (68o), the West threw in the dogmatic watchword round which crystallization ensued. The Councils of Constantinople (380 and Ephesus (431) were more Eastern. The adoption of a non-Biblical phrase at Nicea, constituted a landmark in the growth of dogma; it is true. since the Church—the universal Church speaking by its bishops—says so ; though the Bible does not ! Even at Nicea there was a small obstinate minority. Oliver Wendell Holmes draws the inference that Catholic unanimity means "a majority vote" (followed by excommunication of the few) . Similarly, from Nicea onwards, formulated dogma is accompanied by anathemas. We have good reason for including in our definition of dogma this mark—dogma (for all who receive it) is an affirmation which it is sinful to deny, or to challenge, or to ignore. It is a singularly ominous claim. Another landmark is established for us by the so-called Athana sian creed—a (probably later) Western summary and elaboration of Eastern results, with two well-marked divisions concerning the Trinity and concerning the Person of Christ. It is "before all things" necessary to be accurate in minute detail regarding these doctrines. Sacraments are not so much as named. Indeed, except in the "one baptism for the remission of sins" of the "Nicene Constantinopolitan" creed, the great early creeds are strangely silent concerning sacraments ; although no Catholic mind could ever doubt that it is "he that believeth and is baptized" who shall be saved. In one sense, then, the Athanasian creed marks a cli max. It puts the claim of dogma amazingly high. Though it has not forgotten that Christ is "to judge . . . all men . . . according to their own works," orthodoxy is "before all things necessary." Yet the mediaeval West goes on to alter the balance of emphasis in several ways. First, it works out the theory of sacraments in fuller detail—numbers them as seven ; specifies them one by one; includes in its findings the staggering miracle of transubstantia tion. And in all these points the East accepts results from the West. Sacraments will not save if an obex or hindrance is wil fully interposed (e.g., by deliberate purpose of mortal sin) ; and the doctrine of reception in voto—heaven taking the will for the deed—seems to shake the theory to its foundation. But the em phasis is laid upon the necessity of sacraments, even at the ex pense of doctrine. For, secondly, implicit faith may suffice lay Christians—may possibly suffice many of the clergy. It is a popular error, though shared by some well educated persons, to speak of implicit "obedience." Fides implicita is the correct phrase. By assenting in general terms to Church teaching, while believing explicitly the minimum creed of Heb. xi. 6, one believes by implication whatever else is de fide. We even meet with the po sition that there is merit before God in believing heretically, if one honestly supposes that one's heretical view is taught by the Church. All this is a notable counter-stroke to the detailed dog matism of the Athanasian creed. One understands the motives at work; but it is not with God that "we have to do," still less with conscience, but with—the Church. There is no shadow of excuse in the theory for dissent from Church teaching. Ignorance is encouraged ; bad mistakes are excused ; but submission is ex acted to the uttermost.
The third mediaeval innovation is the Thomist doctrine of mystery. While reason and conscience warrant theistic belief, revelation includes things which reason cannot grasp. Again one comprehends the motive ; but again one observes how the sig nificance of the Church is aggrandized by the new doctrine. An enemy might say that doctrines which are "mysterious" in the technical sense are the fossilized remains of what once was living thought. We have a formula ; true ; but what does the formula contain? No child of the Church dare seek to answer. If the progress of dogmatic definition means the condemnation of views which in the past were innocent, the goal of the dogmatic progress seems to lie altogether beyond the region of knowledge.
Genius in Protestant theology was confined almost entirely to Luther; and even he in later life stiffened and hardened. When he proclaims that justification by faith is in itself the articulus stantis vel cadentis ecclesiae—"article" is a frequent synonym for dogma—he is seeking to gather up a multitude of authoritative dicta in one thrilling personal experience. So too when he gradu ates the books of the New Testament he is claiming to go beyond the letter even of scriptural authority in the strength of his knowledge of the gospel of salvation. In words of his, which are written on his monument at Worms, and which might be called the undying charter of evangelical Protestantism, Those who truly know Christ cannot be caught in the snare of any human author ity. While Luther was incomparably the most daring, all the early reformers hesitated over the great Greek dogmas—but all alike brushed their hesitations aside, and reimposed upon the mod ern time the presuppositions of their fathers. Similarly, the Protestant doctrine of inspiration grew steadily harder. An im perfect but valuable attempt to construe Christianity as a thing of experience was made by Schleiermacher; and the school of Ritschl has even more carefully sought after "Anschluss an Luther." Historically it is a fair question whether Protestant evangelicalism ought to speak of dogmas at all. This means that doctrine is for it a less thing than Christian life, and that "we know in part." The Council of Trent for the first time dogmatically places unwritten tradition side by side with scripture; it also subordinates scripture text and interpretation to the Church's authority. After the period of general relaxation in the century, movements of reaction everywhere set in. In the Church of Rome Pius IX. (1854) proclaimed de suo the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin, and the Council of the Vatican (1870) recognized the Pope's personal authority as equal to that of any council. In quaint technical language, his formal pronouncements are "irreformable." Thus dogma makes quite clear that the "de velopment" of which J. H. Newman and others speak is purely one of accretion. Nothing can be cancelled. Nothing can be bet tered—it is divinely perfect. Alike in 1854 and in 187o, the decreta claim to reiterate a "divinely revealed doctrine" or "dogma." The Vatican council also makes Thomist apologetic de fide. (I) Theism is demonstrable. But (2) there are unintel ligible mysteries in revealed faith. The former position seems highly complicated. It is now a dogma that, dogmatic revelation apart, reason itself proves the being of God, if you hesitate over this, anathema sis. The highroad of reason is prescribed to you, authoritatively; and the goal is also prescribed. If your reason does not lead you to the goal, anathema sis. And if you fail to recognize mysteries above "though not contrary to" reason, anathema sis.
When for the first time a closure was introduced into the House of Commons, Lord Salisbury "did not believe the Liberals were sharpening a scimitar in order to cut bread and butter." The Church of Rome since 1871 has possessed the keenest possible cutting weapon, but has cut with it—nothing. The dogmatic im pulse seems to have temporarily exhausted itself in placing the Pope upon his pinnacle.
At the opposite theological extreme from Roman Catholicism, radical Protestantism shows a germ or a vestige of dogma, or at any rate a real parallel to dogma, if it asserts (with G. B. Foster) the Finality of the Christian Religion.
It has been proposed by an eminent scientific writer, Dr. White head, that we should speak of the "dogmas" of science, and should recognize that these must from time to time be "changed." Apparently, the first principles underlying scientific theory are working hypotheses. Such things of course are endlessly modifi able. But a student of theology must hold that it will not tend to clearness of thought if working hypotheses are called "dogmas." LITERATURE.-Matthew Arnold's Literature and Dogma (1873) is important for literary usage: cf. A. B. Bruce, Chief End of Revelation. Classical and early Christian usages, E. Hatch, Hibbert Lect. (1888), pp. 119, 120; J. B. Lightfoot on Colossians ii. 14 (2o) ; W. Schmidt, Dogmatik, vol. i. (1895)—many quotations in extenso; C. Stange, Das Dogma and seine Beurteilung in der neueren Dogmengeschichte (1898)—a pamphlet protesting against what Loofs terms the "gener ally accepted view." Articles in the (Roman Catholic) Kirchenlexikon of Wetzer and Welte, 2nd ed. (by Hergenrother and Kaulen), 1882-1901. Arts. "Dogmatik" (J. Kvstlin), "Dogmengeschichte" (F. Loofs) in Herzog-Hauck's Encykl. f. Prot. Theol. (vol. iv., 1898). Art. "Glaubensartikel" in previous ed. (Herzog-Plitt, vol. v., 1879) by C. F. Kling and L. F. Schoeberlein. Along with Foster, Troeltsch should be studied; English summaries in R. S. Sleigh's of Christianity and Ernst Troeltsch, and briefly in a paper on Troeltsch by the present writer, Congregational Quarterly (April, 1925) . J. M. E. McTaggart's Some Dogmas of Religion interprets dogma as claiming ultimate absolute truth. (See also THEOLOGY.) (R. MA.)