'Eclectic Ambrosia'

Ten Essays by Harry Butman

Reviewed by Janet Bell Garber

A Thinking Man’s Faith: Essays by Harry R. Butman, D.D., Ann Nielsen, ed., 2000; 43 pp., Cal-West Missions Committee, $8.00

The Rev. Dr. Harry R. Butman’s latest book consists of ten essays of varying length on tenets of the Christian faith as viewed by him after a lifetime of reading and praying and practicing them and thinking about them. Dr. Butman’s unorthodox conclusions may be unacceptable to some of his readers, but no one should reject them before reading and praying and thinking. Others, who have their own problems accepting traditional doctrines, may find his words welcome. For both groups, Dr. Butman’s words will stimulate examining their own beliefs using their God-given minds.

Dr. Butman stresses Christ’s commandment to love the Lord our God with all our minds and hearts and souls and strength (Matt. 22:37, Mark 12:33). He points out that the early Congregational divines were scholars, men of intellectual accomplishments and scientific achievements. One reason Dr. Butman writes these essays is to confirm the tradition of the learned ministry. He also wants Christians to be as comfortable with new scientific discoveries as were our Separatist and Puritan forebears.

Instead of writing this review, I could merely copy the Rev. Dr. Kenneth Gottman’s Foreword, as he captures the essence of Dr. Butman’s briefly stated but powerful words. Dr. Gottman describes Harry Butman’s theology as a "delectably eclectic ambrosia," and indeed it is. While he finds Christian doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation, Atonement, and Original Sin "troubling," Dr. Butman unhesitantly accepts the realities of Satan and his devil angels, of Hell, and of the powers of faith and prayer. One of his standards for belief is the words of Jesus in the Bible, particularly in the synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke; another is his personal experience of devils and of the efficacy of prayer. A third is man’s ability to reason.

But he admits that reason cannot be the only criterion for acceptance of an article of faith. While he reasons that "the infinite cannot be contained in the finite" (i.e., a finite human, Jesus, cannot also be an infinite God, p. 8), Dr. Butman also maintains that "Faith accepts the logical impossibility of the union of the infinite with the finite" (of the infinite God with each of us, p. 22). To Dr. Butman, faith is not a matter "of doctrine, it is an attitude toward God that generates power." And the power of faith is not a foe of reason, but a friend.

Dr. Butman both marvels at the units of measurement (subatomic to the vastness of space) used by physicists today in their studies of God’s ‘other’ book, The Book of Nature (p. 29) and offers words of comfort to those whose faith is being shaken by the mind-numbing discoveries of modern science: "the transcendent Creator of this incredible creation hears the cries of his brokenhearted children and heals them . . . he cares for each of us." (p. 1)

Permission to doubt is one of the great benefits of the freedom we have as Congregationalists, as long as we accept Jesus as our "supreme spiritual guide." Dr. Butman discusses the histories of Christian doctrines and controversies concerning them. He points out that our Puritan and Pilgrim forebears were "rock-solid Calvinists," but that Calvin’s beliefs on sin and salvation are no longer acceptable even to the most conservative Christians today. We cannot accept a God who is so cruel as to decree from the beginning of the World who will join the Heavenly host and who is damned from birth.

That is not to say no one is ever damned. Whether you believe in the Devil or not, you will enjoy—and learn from—Dr. Butman’s chapter on "Devils and Hell." And you must appreciate his statement that "The key to the understanding of Hell is freedom: if we cannot choose between good and evil, we are not free."

Copies of the book may be obtained from Millie Gardner, Publications Chair for Cal West (The Association of Congregational Christian Churches and Ministers of California and Neighboring Western States), 9802 Armley Avenue, Whittier, California 90604. The cost is $8.00 plus postage of $1.30. Profits go to the Missions Committee of Cal West.

Janet Bell Garber is Moderator of the Congregational Church of the Messiah, Los Angeles, California.

Page: Cover, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19