l--Iovv Dabney l,aaked At the -W-arld:

The \1(forld\'iew of Robert L. l) 'l bn c),

PART TWO Re\,. Joseph C. Morecrafr, III

I. THE SPECIFICS OF DABNEY'S BIBLICAL WORLD VIEW

A. DABNEY'S VIEW OF EDUCATION

Dabney wrote much and well on the sub­ject of education and was one of the most ardent enemies of public, state-supported, compulsory education in America. He continually emphasized three points on thi s subject: (1). Education must be Christian education, founded on Christ and the Bible, if it is to be good education; (2). State-sup­ported education will prove to be anti-Chris­tian in its effects; and (3). parents are re­sponsible for the education of their children, not the state.

First, Dabney believed that education must be Christian education, founded on Christ and the Bible, if it is to have good and worthwhile effects . He wrote that education "in Chris­tianity is essential to all education which is worth the name. And we claim more than the admission that each man should at some stage of his training, and by somebody, be taught Christianity; we mean in the fullest sense that Christianity must be a present element of all the training at all times, or else it is not true and valuable education. -... knowledge is really valuable only as it is in order to right actions ... The nature of respon­sibility is such that there can be no neutrality .. . between duty and sin. He that is not with His God is against Him ... Hence as there cannot be in any soul a non-Chris­tian state which is not anti-Chri/itian. It follows that any training which attempts to be non-Christian is therefore anti-Christian . God is the rightful, supreme master and owner of all reasonable creatures, and their nearest and highest duties are to Him. Hence to train a soul away from Him is a ro1:)bery of

God, which He cannot justify in any person or agency whatsoever."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 220-22 1. "To educate the mind without purifying the heart is but 'to phwe a sharp sword in the hand of a madman. "'- p. 222

Dabney ' continues: "The Bible alone applies to the heart and conscience with any distinct certainty the great forces of future rewards and punishments and the powers of the world to come. And, above all, it alone provides the pnrifying influences of redemp­tion. There can be, therefore , no true educa­tion withont moral cnltnre, and 110 true moral culture withont Christianity ; .. The teacher must be Christian."- p. 222

In his day as well as in ours the defense for "secnlar" and "religionsly neutral" public education was presented in this fashion : the state schools will teach sec ular knowledge and the parents may supplement that secular instruction with their religious instruction in the church and home. But Dabney gives a fatal blow to this statist viewpoint by explain­ing that: "( I). The secular teacher depends for the very authority to teach upon the Bible; (2). The exclusiou of the Bib le would put a stigma on it in the child ' s mind which the parent cannot afterwards remove; (3). How can one teach history, ethics, psychol­ogy, cosmogony, without implying some religious opinions?"- DISCUSSIONS , Vol. IV, p . 223. In other words , he believed that religious neutrality in education is impossible.

Second, Dabney nnderstood that state­supported education would prove to be de­structive of Christianity and to the morals and intelligence of the nation. Because Dabney believed that instruction in Christianity was essential to the acquisition of knowledge and morality, and becanse State education is secular and ostensibly religiously neutral , (which is a myth), he understood that "the culture and ethics of the ' common school' [i.e., public school controlled by tbe state] will leave them [students], after a time, too corrupt and atheistic to recognize the value of morality or" its source- the Christian religion. We often hear this apology for the State's wholesale intrusion into education

Oct(jber/November, 2000 - THE COUNSEL ofC/lalcedon-17

advanced with the exactness of a commercial transaction. They 'say: ' It costs less money to build school-houses. than jails.' But what if it turns out that the State 's expenditure in school-houses is one of the things which necessitates the expenditure of jails .?"­DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, p. 195. And then in the succeeding paragraphs of his article he proceed.s to prove his point presenting stati~­tics from Prussian and French schooling, py . referring to De Toqueville who "rem.arked of the United States that crime increased most rapidly where there 'was most instruction," (DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV,p. 195), and by showing the detrimental effects of jmlllic school education in the North.

Third, he held that parents, not the state, are responsible for the education of thei'r . children. In defense of the system of educa­tion that prevailed in' Virginia up to 1860, Dabney wrote: "The tree that bore ' the rank and file' of the Stonewall brigade was good enough for me. ~ This old system evinced ' its wisdom by avoiding the pagan, Spartan theory, which makes the State the parent. It left the parent supreme in his God'-given sphere, as the .responsible party for providing' and directing the education of his own off­spring."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, p . Ul9 . To paraphrase, ' theo)der system was a b~tter system than the newer system of compulsory public schools because it left"the; s.chool as the creature of the parents,. and not of the. State." ~ p . 190. It is as if he were ' address­ing our crisis today when he wrote:

... the pnnciple upon which the State intrudes into ' the parental obligation and function of educating all children, is dangerous and agrarian. It is the teaching of the eibie and of sound political ethics that the ' education of children belongs to the sphere of the family and is the dutY of the parents. The theQry that the children of the Commonwealth are the charge of the COmlnonweahh is a coroinob one, derived from heathen Sparta and Piato 's heathen republic, and , connected by reguiar, logical sequence With legalized prostitution and the dissolution ofthe conjugal tie.­"The State Free School System" in DISCUSSIONS, Vol. Iv, p. 194

Dabney concludes his critique of "The ' State, Eiee School System" with these pointed remarks: "Our old Virginia system, besides

itsecononiy, has these' great logical advan­tageS: . that it leaves to parents, without usurp'aiion,their proper function as creators and electors oftheit children' s schools : .. Goveriuoebt'is not the creator but the crea­ture ofhriman society, ' The Government has no mission from God to make, the community; on theci>ntrary, the community should make the Government. Whatlhe community shall be is determined by Providence, where it is happily determined by far other causes than the meddling of governments~by historical causes in the distant past~by vital ideas propagated by greatindividual minds-espe­cially by the Church and jts doctrines. The only communities which have had their char­acters manufactured for them by their go v­ernQ1ents have had a villainously bad charac­ter~like the Chinese and the Yankees. Noble races make their governments; ignoble ones are made by them.;'- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 223-224

Although Protestants historically believed in the Christian· education of children by , parents, with the assistance of the church, and not by the state, in Dabney 's day Protes­tants were caving in to the anti-Chri~tian idea, created by the Unitarians, thai the state is to control education and every other aspect of human so'ciety for the benefit and ad­vanceIilent ~f that society. Da:bney rebukes Protestanlis in his article , "The Attractions of Pop'ery, M for their defection, leaving only the Roman Catholic Church to 'stand against the secularization of education , In this battle for the freedom of education from the state, Dabney complains that "the chief, the only organized protest heard in Ainerica comes from the Romish Church. It is she who stands forth preeminent, almost single handed, to assert the sacred rights of Chris­tian parents in the training of the souls they have' begotten,of C,hrist in the l)urture .of the souls ·he di'ed to redeem. Today it is this Romish Church which stands forth precisely in the position of the Luthers, Calvins, Knoxs and Mathers as the main; central point, which is , that the education of th e young should be Christian, and should be committed to Chrisfian hands . ."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, p. 548

18 ~THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon - October/Noyember, 2000

Dabney's prophetic foresight manifests itself in his remarks on the effects of the secularization and nationalization of education in his article, "Secularized Education," where he predicts: " ... nearly all public men and divines declare that the State schools are the glory of America... And we have seen that their complete secularization is logically inevitable. Christians must prepare them­selves then, for the following results: All prayers, catechisms, and Bibles will ulti­mately be driven out of the schools. -Infidelity and practical ungodliness will become increasingly prevalent among Protes­tant youth, and our churches will have a more arduous contest for growth if not for exist­ence."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, p. 242

B. DABNEY'S VIEW OF POLITICS

Dabney had much to say about politics in articles, letters and seminary lectures. This was an important aspect of his worldview as a Christian who believed in the comprehen­sive. authority of the Word of God. He en­deavored to base his political views upon the Bible, although at times he was more infln­enced by John Calhoun and the constitutional framers from Virginia, than the Bible.

I. TIIE BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF "STATES' RIGHTS"

As the following words of Dabney attest, he believed that in the Hebrew Repnblic of the Old Testament, God offered the world a model' for the formation of civil governments by the nations of the world so as to insure justice in those nations.

So far as God gave to the chosen people a political fOlID, the one which He prefened was a confederation oflitlle republican bodies represented by their elderships. (Exodus 18:25,26; Exodus 3: 16; Numbers 11:16, 17; Nnmbers 32:20-27.)

When he conceded to them, as it were under protest, a regal nonn, it was a constitutional and elective monarchy. (I Smnue11O:24,25.) The rights of each tribe were secured against vital infringement of this constitution by its own veto power. They retained the prerogative of protecting themselves against the usurpations of the elective king by withdrawing at their own sovereign discretion from the confederation. (I Kings 12:13-16.)

The history of the secession of the ten tribes under Jeroboam is often misunderstood through gross cm·elessness. No divine disapprobation is anywhere expressed against the ten tribes for exercising their right of withdrawal from the perverted federation. When Rehoboam began a war of coercion he was sternly forbidden by God to pursue it. (I Kings 12:24.)

The act by which Jeroboam made Israel to sin against the Lord was wholly mIother and subse­quent one-his meddling with the divinely appointed constitution ofthe church to promote merely pOlitical ends. (I Kings 12:26-28.)

In historical incidents such as these re­vealed in the Bible, Dabney saw "God's preference for the representative republic as distinguished from the levelling democ-racy ... "- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III, p. 498

2. THE ORIGIN OF CIVIL GOVERNMENT

Dabney taught his seminary students that the Christian view of civil government begins with the revealed truth that the origin of civil government is in the will of God, not in a social contract created by man. Therefore since the powers that be are ordained by God, they are accountable to the God who is their Origin and who is supreme over them, not to the whims and fancies of the majority.

3. THE FUNCTION AND POWERS OF CIVIL GOVERNMENT'

The function of civil government, accord­ing to Dabney, is "in general, to secure to man his life, liberty and property. - The powers of the civil magistrate then are lim­ited by righteousness ... to these general functions, regulating and adjudicating all secular rights, [i.e., non-parental and non­ecclesiastical rights], and protecting all members of civil society in their enjoyment of their several proper shares thereof. This general fnnction implies a number of others; prominently, these three: taxation, punish­ment, including capital punishment for capital crimes, and defensive war. For the first see Matthew 22:21, Romans 13:6,7, for the sec­ond see Genesis 9:5,6, Numbers 35:33, Ro­mans 13: 1-5, for the third, Exodus 17:9, Luke 3:14,15, Acts 10:1,2. The same thing follows from the power of capital punishment. Ag-

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gressive war is wholesale murder. The magistrate who is charged with the sword, to avenge and prevent domestic murder, is a fortiori charged to punish and prevent the foreign murderer."- LECTURES IN SYS­TEMATIC THEOLOGY, pp. 869-870

C. DABNEY'S VIEW OF WHY THE SOUTH LOST THE WAR BETWEEN THE STATES

Whereas Dabney became a convinced and patriotic Confederate, he was severely criti­cal of South Carolina for precipitating the War. On December 28, 1860, Dabney wrote to his mother: "I feel sick at heart at the state of the country. I have been attempting, in my feeble way, to preach peace, and to rouse Christians to their duty in staying the tide of passion and violence. - The very Christians seem to have lost their senses with excitement, fear and passion; and everything seems hurrying to civil war. - As for South Carolina, the little impudent vixen has gone beyond all patience. She is as great a pest as the Abolitionists."- Johnson's , LIFE AND LETTERS OF ROBERT LEWIS DABNEY, p. 215 . Later, in a letter to Dr. Moses Hoge of Richmond, dated January 4, 1861, Dabney wrote: "I considered Lincoln ' s election no proper casus belli, least of all for immediate separate secession, which could never be the right way under any circumstances . 'Hence, I regard the conduct of South Carolina as unjustifiable towards the United States ·at large, and towards her Southern sisters, as treacherous, wicked, insolent and mischie­vous . She has,. in my view, worsted the common cause, forfeited the righteous strength of our position, and aggravated our difficulties of position a hundredfold. Yet regard 'to our own rights unfortunately com­pels us to shield her ftom the ch<lstisement which she most condignly deserves . But, even in shielding Iier, we rnust see to it, as . we believe in and fear a righteous God, that we do no iniquity as she has done. - I reply, it is never too late or too dangerous to do right. Verily, there is a God who judgeth in the earth. How can we appeal to Him ' in the beginning of what may be a great and arduous contest, when we signalize its open­ing by a wrong? - But I greatly fear the temper of our people is no longer considerate

enough to place themselves thoroughly in the right in this matter." - Johnson, LIFE AND LETTERS, p. 222

'Dabney remained opposed to secession until President Lincoln's unlawful and fatal call to m~ster soldiers from Virginia to invade and coerce ' South Carolina and the other seceding states back into the Union. Almost overnight he and the vast majority of Virgin­ians became secessionist. He came to agree with James Henley Thornwell ' s sentiments expressed in a letter dated November 24, 1860: "It is impossible to live any longer, with security and self-respect, in the present Union."- Johnson ' s, LIFE AND LETTERS, p. 224. In a famous letter written by Dabney and published in the Richmond papers and throughout the South in April, 1861, Dabney sought to vindicate Virginia's right to go to war against the Federal Government in Wash­ington. He defined hi s position, which was also the position of Robert E. Lee, Thomas J. Jackson, Jefferson Davis and Alexander Stephens, all of whorn were strict Constitu­tionalists who had been anti-secession. He wrote:

... 1 wish ... to lay this final testimony before the Christians ofthe North, on behalf of myself imd my brethren in Virginia, that the guilt lies not at our door. This mountainous aggregate of enormous crime, of a mined Constitution, of cities sacked, of reeking battlefields, of scattered churches, of widowed wives and orpllaned children, of souls plunged into heD; we roD it from us, taking the Judge to witness, before whom you and we will stand, that the blood is not upon our heads. When the danger first rose threat­ening in the horizon, out cry was, "Christians to the rescue." ~ Yes, it was the Christians of Virginia; cornbined with her other citizens, who caused her to endure wrongs, until eodurance ceased to be a virtue; to hold out the olive branch, even after it had been spurned again and again. - And thus they dared to stretch over her head the minatory rod of correction!· But no sooner was the perilous experiment applied than a result was revealed ... This patient, peaceful, seemingly hesitating paralytic flamed up at the insolent touchlike a pyramid of tire, and VIrginia stands forth in her immortal youth .. . wielding that sword 'which has ever flashed before the eyes of aggressors, the Sic semper tyrannis .... AD her demands for constitutional redress have been

20 - THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon- October/November, 2000

refused ... the infamous altemative bas been forced upon ber either to' brave the oppressor's rod or to aid him in the destruction of her sisters and her children, because they are contending nobly, if too rashly, for rights common to them and to her; and, to crown all, the Constitution of the United States has been rent in fragments by the effort to muster new forces, and wage war without authority of law, and to coerce sovereign States into adbesion .. . Hence there is now but one mind and one bealt in Virginia .. .In one week the whole State has been converted into a camp ... - ... whatever maYhavebefallen us [in the South], it will leave you [in the North] with a consolidated federal government, with State sovereignty extin­guished, with the Constitution in ruins, and with your rights and safety a prey to a frightful combination of radicalism and military despotism. - How horrible is this war to be, of a whole North against a whole South! - How iniquitous is its real object-the conquest and subjugation of free and equal States. - if, then, we bave the right of peacefully severing our connection with the former confederation, and the attempt lias been made by' force to obstruct that rigbt, they who attempted the obstruction are the first aggressors. The first act of war was commit­ted by thegovemrnent of Washington against South Carolioa, when fortresses intended lawfully, only for her protection, were armed for her subjugation.' LIFE AND LEttERS, pp. 225f

Dabney also had his views as to why the South lost the War between the States , although, in his mind, the principles for which the South fought were right and true. He discusses two reasons: (1), The purifying of the South morally and spiritually and (2). Tbe chastisement of the Sonth for her failure to reform slavery by tbe Bible.

In his article , "Tbe Duty of the Hour," Dabney explains that mournful, moral degen­eracy of a people is the result of ages of totalitarianism, despotism and tyranny. Re­ferring to his own defeated South, he writes: "For, young gentlemen, as the true dishonor of defeat lies only in this deterioration of spirit, so it is tbe direst wrong wbich the injustice of the conqueror can inflict. -Dread, then, this degradation of spirit as worse than defeat, than subjugation, t~an poverty, than hardship, than prison, than death. " - DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, p. 116

He goes on to explain that "this degradation ... does not necessarily accom­pany our prostrate condition."- p. 118. Tben, he gives wbat he believes is one of the reasons God caused the South to lose the War, although he was convinced the South was right in what it was fighting for:

Divine Providence often makes the furnace of · persecution the place of cleansing for individual saints. Why may it not be so for a Christian. people? Why may not a' race of men come forth from their trials, like the gold seven times refined in the fire, with their pride chastened, and yet their virtues purified? This can be from the only cause which sanctifies the sufferings of the Christian, the inworkings of the grace of God. Nothing is more true than that the natural effect of mere pain is not to purifY, but to harden the sinful heart of man, exasper­ating at once its evils and its miseries.

The cleansing Word and Spirit of God alone interprets its suffering to it and convert them into healthful medicines of its faults . So it is the power of . true Christianity, and that alone, which can minister to us as a people the wholesome uses of adversity. The salvation of the life of the Sonthern society must be found by taking the Word of God as our constant guide.

. to what course ofa~tionshould this spirit of unyielding integrity prOl)lpt us? The answer from those infallible oracles is easy. While yon refrain

.. from the suggestion of revenge' and despair~ .. . resolve to abate nothing, to concede nothing of righteous conviction. Truckle to no falsebood and conceal no true principle; but ever assert THE RIGHT with snch means of endurance, self-sacrifice and passive fortitude as the dispensation of Providence has left you. If wholesale wrongs must be perpetuated, if wholesale rights must be trampled on, let our assail­ants do the whole work and incur the whole guilt. Resolve that no losses, nor threats, nor penalties, shall evelY make you yield one jot or tittle of the true

· orjnst in principle ...

We are a beaten, conquered people, gentlemen, and yet if we are true to ourselves, we have no cause

· for humiliation, however mnch for deep sorrow. It is only the atheist who adopts success as the criterion of right. It is not !! new thing in the history of men that God appoints to the brave and true the stern task of contending and falling in a righteous quanel. "­DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. !l8f .

OctoberlNovember, 2000 - THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon" 21

Dabney intimated in 1865 a second pos­sible reason for the defeat of the Confed­eracyby the Union: the failure· of the South to structure Southern slavery according to the Bible'. He wrote: "When I claim that the South did thus much for the Africans, I am far from boasting. We ought to have done much more. Instead of pointing to it with self-laudation, it becomes us , with profound humility towards God, to confess our short­comings towards our servants. He has . been pleased, in His sovereign and fearful dispen­sation, to lay upon us a grievous affliction, and we know He is too just to do this except for our sins. While I am as certain as the sure word of Scriptures can make me con­cerning any principle of social duty, that there was nothing sinful in the relation of master and slave itself, I can easily believe that our failure to fulfill some of the duties of that righteous relation is among the sins for which God's hand now makes us smart. And it does not becOme those who are under His disci­pline to boast of their good works. No; verily we have sinned; my argumen( is that you must do more for the negro than we sinners of the South have done. "- "To Major General Howard," p. 32, DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV

In 1851, in a letter to his brother, Dabney writes: . "Here is our policy, then, .to push the Bible argument continually, to drive abolition­ism to the wall, to compel it to assume an anti-Christian position. By so doing we compel the whole Christianity of the North to array itself on our side. - But to enjoy the advantages of this Bible argument in our favor, slave-holders will have to pay a price. And the price is this . They must be willing to recognize and gr!lnt in s!!lves those rights which are a part of our essenti'ill humanity, some of which are left without recognition or guarantee by law,!lnd some infringed by law. These !lre the rights of immortal !lnd domes­tic beings. If we take the ground that the power to neglect and infringe these interests is an essential and necessary part of the institution of slavery; then it cannot be de­fended. One thing is certain, the rel!ltions of an hnmortal being to his Maker override all others. We must come out !lnd grant that our right to hold slaves to labor does not include

a right to make a husband guilty of the sin of separation from his wife, for other cause than fornication, or to violate the chastity of a female by forcible means; and that practices or laws which do any of these things are not a part of the Scriptunl !lnd lawful institutjon; but abuses. Unless Southern men are willing to take this position,. they cannot conquer in the discussion." - . quoted by Thomas Cary Johnson in hisbook, THE LIFE AND LET­TERS OF ROBERT LEWIS DABNEY, p. 129, (Edinburg, Scotland: The Banner of Truth Trust, 1977 reprint; first published in 1903).

Eugene D. Genovese has written that: "In 1840 the Reverend Robert L. Dabney worried that the abolitionist agitation was hardening the hearts of Virginians and thwarting efforts at reform [of Southeru slavery to bring it in line with the Biblical laws on slavery]. Dabney responded with a demand for higher standards. Specifically, blacks should not be executed for crimes for which whites ·were sentenced to a year or two in prison, and blacks must have the right to 'resist wanton cruelty and injury.' He excoriated ' unprin­cipled' masters who inflicted starvation, oppression, and cruel punishments on their slaves. He urged protection of the family relation, noting that the. black woman must be mistress of her own chastity.' If Southerners did not correct these abus.es, he charged, they would be turning away from Jesus. In 1851, Dabney published a series of widely read articles in the Richmond Enquirer and church publications in which he singled out the morality of slavery as tbebedroCk iSsue in the sectional quarrel. If Southerners stand firmly on the Bible, he wrote, the abolitionists will have to confess defeat or ruin them­selves by exposing their infidelity. But, he added, Southetners can only stand on the Bible if they acknowledge that they have no right to sep·arate man and wife or in any other way violate Christian teaching."-A CONSUMING FIRE: THE FALL OF THE CONFEDERACY IN THE MIND OF THE WHITE CHRISTIAN SOUTH, (Athens, GA : The University of Georgia Press, 1998), pp. 11-12.

The South did not give heed to Dabney's

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call for the Biblical reconstruction of slavery, and so, according to him and many other ministers whose call for slave reform went unheeded. Some in his day believe that "God was punishing Southerners for their sins-not for having been slaveholders, but for failing in their duty as masters."- Genovese, p.68

D. DABNEY'S VIEW OF THE ROLE OF WOMEN IN THE RESTORATION OF THE

AMERICAN REPUBLIC

Dabney, who held to the Biblical, orthodox and Reformed view of the headship of the man in family, church and state, and of the fnnctional subordination of woman to man in a godly social order, did not at all believe in the inferiority of women. In the conclusion of his article, "The Duty of the Hour," he as­signs them the highest of honors and respon­sibilities:

... never before was the welfare of a people so dependent on their mothers, wives and sisters, as now and here. I freely declare that under God my chief hope for my prostrate country is in their women. Early in the war, when the stream of our noblest blood began to flow so liberally in battle, I said to an honored citizen of my State, that it was so uniformly our best men who were made the sacrifice there was reason to fear that the staple and pith of the people of the South would be pemlanentiy depreciated. His reply was: "There is no danger of this while the women of the South are what they are. Be assured lhe mothers will not permit the offspring of such martyr-sires to depreciate."

But since, this river of generous blood has swelled into a flood, What is worse, the remnant of the survivors, few, subjugated, disheartened, almost despairing and, alas, dishonored, because they have not disdained life, on such terms as are left us; are subjected to every influence from without, which can be malign311tiy devised to sap the foundations of their manhood and degrade them into fit materials for slaves. If our women do not sustain them they will sink. Unless the spirits which rule and cheer their homes can reanimate tileir self-respect, confirm their resolve, and sustain their personal honor, tiley will at length become tile base serfs their enemies desire. Outside their homes, everything conspires to depress, to tempt, to seduce them. - Only within their homes is there, beneath the skies, one ray of light or warmth to prevent their freezing into despair.

THERE, in your homes, is your domain. There YOU rule with the scepter of affection, and not our conquerors. We beseech you, wield that gentle empire in behalf ofthe principles, the patriotism, tile religion, which we inllerited from our mothers. Teach our ruder sex that only by a deathless love to these can woman's dear love be deserved or won. Him who is ttue to these crown with your favor. Let the wretch who betrays them be exiled forever from the paradise of your 31ms. Then shall we be saved, saved from a degradation fouler than tile grave. Be it yours to nurse with more tilan a vestal's watchful­ness, the sacred flame of our virtue now so smoth­ered. Your task is unobtrusive; it is performed in th'e privacy of home, and by the gentle touches of daily love. But it is the noblest work which mortal can perform, for it furnishes the polished stones, with which the temple of our liberties must be repaired. - Such is your work; the home and fireside are the scenes of your indusiry. But the materials which you shape are the souls of men, which are to compose the fabric of our church and state. The politician, the professional man, is but the cheap, rule, day laborer, ' who moves and lifts the finished block to its place. You are the true artists, who endue it with fitness and beauty; and therefore yours is the nobler task.­DISCUSSIONS, VoL IV, pp. 120-122

E. DABNEY'S VIEW OF LIBERTY AND EQUALITY IN A SOCIAL ORDER

To Dabney the civil government created by the Constitntion was "a federation of sovereign States. - By their several and sovereign acts they created a central feder­ated government, with limited powers strictly defined, and deputed to this common-agent certain powers over their own citizens, to be impartially exercised for the eqnal behoof of all the partners. All other powers , including that of judging and redressing vital infractious of this federal compact, they jealously and expressly reserved to themselves or to their people. To the outside world they were to be:1' one, to each other they were to be still eqnaiS and independent partners. Each State mnsi be a republic ... The functions of the general government were to be few and defined, its expenditures modest, and its burdens in time of peace light. - But this century has seen all this reversed; and conditions of human society have grown up , which make the system of our free forefathers obviously

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impracticable in the future. And this is so, not because the old forms were not good enough for this day, but becau.se they. Were too good for it."" "The New Soutlr,"DIS­CUSSIONS, Vol. IV, p. 5

He held to these old political principles so tenaciously because he believed they com­prised the poliHcai model ordered by the Word of God. In his article on "Anti-Biblical Theories of Rights," he wrote: "So far as God gave to the chosen people a political form, the one which He preferred was a confederation of little repu.blican bodies represented by their elderships. (Exodus 18:25,26; Exodus 3:16; Numbers 1l:16, 17; Numbers 32:20-27)."4- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III,p.498

He goes on i,n his article on "The New South" to poi!)t out what those adverse conditions are. The first in importance and impact is "the silent substitution, ,under the same nomenclature, of another theory of human tights, in contrast with, and hostile to, that of our ,fathers. Those wise men did indeed believe in a certain equality; but it was that which the British constitution (whose principles they inherited) was wont to express by the maxim: that every British citizen ' was equal before the law.' The particular franchises of the peer and the peasant were very unequal, bu.Un this impor­tant respect the two men were 'equ.al before the law,' that the peasant's smaller fran- , chises were protected by the same law , which shielded the peer ' s larger one. This is the equality of the golden rule, the equality of that Bible which ordained the constitution of human society out of superiors , inferiors and equals; the equ.ality of the inspired Job (ch. 31:13-(5) who in the very act of asserting his right to his slave, added: Did not He that made me make him? If I did despise the cause of my man-servant 'or my maid­servant when they contended with me, what then shaH I do when God riseth up? This is the equality which is thoroughly consistent with that wide diversity of natural capacities, virtues , station, sex, inherited possessions, which inexorable faci'discloses everywhere and by means of which social organization is possible. But in place of

this .. . our modern politician now teaches, under the same name, the equality of the Jacobin, of the' Sans culotte,' which absu.rdly claims for every human the same specific powers and rights. Yes, your Greeley teaches ... the very doctrine of the frantic Leveller Lilburn, whose book these great English RepublicanS caused (not your tyranni­cal Stuart but the comnlOnwealth's men) to be burned in London by the common hang­man!

"Our fathers valued liberty, but the liberty for which they contended was each person;s privilege to do those things and ,those only to which God's Law and Providence gave him a moral right. The liberty of nature which your modern asserts is absolute license: the privilege of doing whatever a corrupt will craves , except as this license is curbed by a voluntary 'social contract'. The fathers of our country could have adopted the subliJ1le

' words ... . LexRex: The' Law is king. - But now, by this new Republicanism, tpe supreme law is the will or caprice of what happens to be the major mob, the suggestion of the demagogue who is most artful to seduce."­DI.SCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 5ff. With these ' words he was challenging the form of civil government called democracy. ' , '

In 1888, Dabney returned fire on "a .new attack uppn God's IIoly Word." The new . eilemy upon which pe fired was named in the missile he fired upon them, "Anti-Biblical Theories of Rights," published in DISCUS­SIONS, Vol. III. These new theories to Americans originated with the Jacobites, i. e., the French radicals who instigated the bloody French Revolution of 1789 to expunge Chris­tianity from France.

Because, for Dabney, the Bible set forth· as a model for nations a representative repUblic ratiler than, a levelling democracy, any theory of human tights must be consis­tent with these divinely revealed teachings. God has ordered in human society superiors, inferiors and equals, as the Westminster Larger and Shorter .Catechisms teach in ·their exposition oHhe Fifth Commandment, "mak- ' ing the household represented by the parent and master the integral unit of the social

24 - THE COUNSEL of Chalcedon - OctliberlNlivember, 2000

fabric, assigning to each order, higher or lower, its rule or subordination under the distributive equity of the law. On the other hand, it protected each order in its legal privileges, and prohibited oppression and injustice as to all."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III, pp. 498-499. And, therefore, Dabney reiter­ates time and again that Scriptural social ethics defines equality as "equality before the law," as we have explained ahove.

Dabney showed that Job understood "this maxim of Bible republicanism" in chapter 31:13,14, as did the Apostle Paul, in Eph­esians 6:9 and Colossians 4: 1.5 In those texts, said Dabney, masters, kurioi, are to give to their servants , douloi, those things that are just and equal. Both texts teach the same doctrine: "On the one hand, they assert the relation of superior and inferior, witb their unequal franchises; on the other band, tbey assert in tbe same breath tbe equal moral obligation of botb as bearing the common relation to the one divine Maker and Judge. The radical social theory asserts, under the same name, a totally different doctrine; its maxim is 'all men are born free and equal.' It supposes the social fabric constituted of individuals naturally absolute and sovereign as its integers , and tbis by some sort of social contract, in entering whicb individual men act with a freedom equally complete as to God aud each otber. It defines each one's natural liberty as freedom to do whatever he wishes, and his civilliberty ... as that remainder of his natural prerogative not surrendered to the social contract. 6 - So widespread and profound is this confusion of thought, tbat the majority of American people and of their teachers practically know and bold no other theory than the Jacobin one. They assume, as a matter of COllrse, that it is this tbeory which is the firm logical basis of constitu­tional government; whereas history and science show that it is a fatal heresy of thought, which uproots every possible founda­tion of just freedom, and grounds only the most ruthless despotism. But none the less is this the passionate belief of millions, for the sake of which they are willing to assail tbe Bible itself."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. Ill, p. 500

Why did Dabney think that adopting a

Jacobin view of liberty, equality and human rights would require "surrendering the inspi­ration [and divine authority] of the Scriptures to these assaults of a social science so­called?"- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III, p. 503. The answer to that question is this: the Bible denies everyone of the corollaries of the Jacobin doctrine, "and that with a fatal distinctness which no honest exposition can evade."- p. 503. He then proceeds, point by point, with the use of sound Biblical exegesis, to show bow the Bible refutes the humanist theory of rights'. His points are as follows:

First, [the doctrine of the imputation of Adam's sin to the human race], the humanistic view ofrights repudiates the Biblical doctrine of the imputation of sin from Adam to the race and "of the consequences of moral conduct from one person to another as irrational and unjust."- p. 503. Dabney then refers to Genesis 3:16, ITimothy2:llf, Genesis 9:252-27, Exodus 20:5, Deuteronomy 25:19 and Matthew 23:32-36 to prove his point

Second, [the fact that God distributes franchises and fortunes unequally in the Hebrew Republic], the Bible discards the view tbat "no privilege or franchise enjoyed by some adults in tbe state can be justly withheld from any other order of adults ... for God distributed the franchises unequally in the Hebrew commonwealth."- p. 504. He refers to Deuteronomy 21:15,16,Exodus 18:21, Joshua 22: 14, I Peter 2: 13, Romans 13:7.)

Third, [powers and privileges are distributed by God among men sovereignly and unequally], the humanist denounces "not only oppressive inequalities, but every difference in the distribution of powers and privileges. Now, the Scriptures recognize and ordain such distribution ... Such is the stubborn fact."- p. 505. He then refers his readers to Numbers 18:22,23, Hebrews 7:13,14, Leviticus 21:13,141, 25:42-47, Exodus 17:16, Deuteronomy 23:3-8. (He also shows how Galatians 3:28 does not contradict this Biblical teaching.)

Fourth, [the Hebrew Republic was not founded on universal suffrage], according to the Bible, "God's commonwealth was not founded on universal suf­frage. That He rejected the Jacobinical principle is plain from the history of the Gibeonites," who were given the freedom to own homes, who were pro­tected in certain rights, who were not slaves, and yet they were not fully enfranchised citizens, Joshua

October/November, 2000 - THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon - 25

9:27. These Gibeonites, however law-abiding, did not enjoy equality with the young Israelites, "which the J acobin theory demands indiscriminately as the inalienable right of all. And to mal<e the matter worse, the Scripture declares that this disqualification descended by imputation from the goilt of the first generation's paganism and fraud upon Joshua.

Fifth, [in human society God has ordained the functional subordination of women to men, but not implying woman's inferiority to man], Dabney saw the emergence of "women's rights" and ''women's suffrage" as corollaries of the humanistic theory. "Our purpose here is not to debate the wisdom or equity of that claim, but to show what God thinks of it."- p. 507. He showed that both the Old Testament and New Testament teach the functional subordina­tion of women to men in a godly social order, but not the inferiority of women to men, Numbers 27:8, I Corinthians 11:3, 14 :34, Ephesians 5 :22-24, I Timothy 2:11,12, I Timothy 5:14, Titos 2:4,5, 1 Peter 3:1,5,6.

Sixth, [according to the O.T. and the N.T. domes­tic slavery is lawful], Dabney was tenacious in his belief that Scripture teaches the lawfulness of domestic slavery, while Jacobinism repudiates it. He summarizes the case which he made thoroughly in THE DEFENSE OF VIRGINIA AND THE SOU1H: (1). God predicted the rise of domestic bondage as the penalty and remedy for the bad morals of those subjected to it, Genesis 9:25; (2). God protects property in slaves as any other kind of property in the Decalogoe, Exodus 20:17; (3). Numerous slaves were bestowed on Abraham as marks of God's favor, Genesis 24:35; (4). The relation of master and slave was sanctified by the sacrament of circumcision/baptism which was received by the slave on the basis of his master's faith, Genesis 17:27; (5). The Angel of the Covenant himself remanded a fugitive slave to her mistress, but later assisted her in her journey when she was legally manumitted, Genesis 21:17-21; (6). The civillaws of Moses expressly allowed Hebrew citizens to bny and own pagans as life-long and hereditary slaves, Leviticus 25 :44-46; (7). Biblical Law declares that the involuntary labor of slaves is the property of their masters. "The New Testament left the institution with precisely the same sanction as the Old. - It is vain to advance the theory ... that the New Testament corrected and amended whatever was harsh or barbaric in the Old. For, in the first pia"e, i ritterly deny the assertion. The New Testament left the rehltion of master and bondman just where Moses

placed it. And, in the second place, Jesus and His apostles expressly goarantee the inspiration of Moses, without any reservation ... so that they have embarked their credit as divine and infallible teachers along with that of Moses. Both must stand or fall together. - Let every man make up his mind honestly either to reject the Bible as a fable, and thus preserve his Jacobin humanitarianism, or frankly to surrender the latter in order to retain the gospel."­pp.510-511

Dabney then presents the New Testament texts endorsing slavery as defined by Moses: Ephesians 6:9, Colossians 4:1, 3:22-25, Luke 7:2-9, Acts 10:34,35, Luke 17:7-10, Luke 15:19, I Peter 2: 18,19, I Timothy 6:1,2, Philemon If, I Timothy 6:3-5. ''The honest student, then, of the New Testament can make nothing less of its teachings on this point than that domestic slavery, as defined in God's word, and practiced in the milnner enjoined in the Epistles, is still a lawful relation under the neW dispensation as well as under the old. " , - DISCUSSIONS, Vol. ill, p. 512

Dabney concludes his critique of the "anti­Biblical theories of rights," so prevalent in his day and ours , with these words: "Since the opinions and practices hostile to the Scriptures are so pr.otean, so subtle, and so widely diffused, there is no chance for a successful defense of the truth except in uncompromising resistance to the beginnings of error; to parley is to be defeated. -There is but one safe position for the sacra­mental host [i.e., the church]: to stand on the whole Scripture, and refuse to concede a

. single point."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III, p. 520

In his article "The Attractions of Popery," DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 542, Dabney clearly distinguishes between an anti-Chris­tian view of rights and the Christian view and then shows how thoroughly Americans by 1894 had rejected the Christian view for the anti-Christian view:

A hundred years ago French atheism gave the world the Jacobin tbeory of political rights. The Bible had been teaching mankind for three thousand years the great doctrine of men's moral equality before the univernru. father, the great basis of all free, just and truly republican forms of civil society. Atheism now travestied this true doctrine by her mortal heresy of

26 - THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon - October/November, 2000

the absolute equality of men, asserting that every human being is naturally and inalienably entitled to every right, power, and prerogative in civil society which is allowed to any man or any class.

The Bible taught a liberty which consists in each man's unhindered privilege of having and doingjnst those things, and no otllers, to which he is rationally and morally entitled. Jacobinism taught the liberty of Iicense---every man's natnral right to indulge his own absolute will; and it set up this fiendish caricatnre as the object of sacred worship for mankind. Now, democratic Protestantism in these United States has become so ignorant, so superficial and wilful, tllat it confounds the true republicanism with this deadly heresy of Jacobinism. It has ceased to know a difference. Hence, when the atheistic doctrine begins to bear its natural fruit oflicense, insubordina­tion, commllUism and anarchy, this bastard demo­ct·atic Protestantism does not know how to rebuke them. - p. 542

F. DABNEY'S VIEW OF ECONOMICS

Dabney wrote several articles on eco­nomic issues , but his most famous oue, which has been reprinted in boolelet form in the late twentieth century, is "Principles of Christian Economy," DISCUSSIONS, Vol. I , pp. If. In this article he sets forth the basic elements of a Biblical and Christian understanding of economics. The foundational presupposition of Christian economics is that "our property is purely a trust fund, and the whole of it is to be used for the benefit of the owner. There is to be no division at all. There is to be no line drawn between God's portion and our portion. All is God ' s, and all is to be employed for him. Here is the only true and safe starting-point for deducing our practical rules of Christian expenditure. The idea of a stewardship is a correct illustration of the nature of the tenure by which we hold our possessions. - A steward is one who manages property which does not belong to him. - But the Scripture likens our relation to God to one far closer and stricter than the steward's. We are ourselves God's property. We belong to Him, body and soul, just as truly as the riches which He has lent us."- p. 2

He tben delineates the specific implications of this presupposition: (1). ''It is proper that we should employ so much of God's property as is necessary in

our own sustenance. - This expenditure is most strictly an expenditure in God's service, since it results in worle done for Him."- p. 4. (2). "it is right to employ a part of our Master's possessions in sustaining and rearing the families which He has committed 10 us."- p. 5. (3). "A part ofllie posses­sions entrusted 10 us may be rightfully employed in making a reasonable provision for ourselves and those dependent on us against the contingencies of the futnre."- p. 6. (4). "Those who have any prop­erty remaining after these three lawful deductions are made are required obviously, by our principles, to use it in doing good. - Our duty is not done till we have conscientiously selected that object by which our expenditure will do the highest honor to God and good to His creatures that are within our reach."- p. 8

G. DABNEY'S VIEW OF THE FUTURE

Dabney was emotionally defeated becanse of the devastation of the South and of her Christendom by tbe War Between the States' He saw tbe · war as America ' s bloody French Revolution aimed at destroying a Christian moral and social order in this land and the Reconstruction that followed as America's Reign of Terror, similar to the one that followed the French Revolution of 1789. The gradual betrayal of the South's distinc­tive Christian beritage by many southerners also was a discouragement to him. Never­theless, as most Southern Presbyterians at the time, he still believed in the triumph of Christian truth and the kingdom of God in history before the second coming of Cbrist and the day of resurrection when all tbese triumphs in time will be consummated, I Corinthians 15:24f. He understood that a complete worldview has a futureview, and the futureview of a Christian worldview must be an optimistic, victory-oriented one. Further­more, how one views the future will deter­mine how he will face the present witb its trials and struggles and apparent set-backs for God's people.

In faithfulness to his commitment to the Westminster Standards, especially to Larger Catechism Questiou 191, he taught his theo­logical students at Union Seminary that before tbe second coming of Christ several other events must occur because they are prophesied in the Bible: (1). The overthrow

October/November, 2000 - THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon - 27

of the Antichrist, which to Dabney meant the collapse and removal of the Roman Catholic papacy from human society; (2). The procla­mation of the gospel to all nations and the embracing of that gospel by the world's nations , peoples and families; (3) . The gen­eral triumph of Christianity over all false religions in all the world's nations ; and (4). The conversion of the Jews to faith in Christ and their restoration to the Christian Church.!· For those of you who do not recognize this position, it is called "post­millennialism" and was the prevalent escha­tology in the Old South. "

Therefore, even in · the midst of the devas­tation of reconstruction in the South, Dabney could declare triumphantlyI':

Centuries hence, if man shall continue in his present state so 10rig, when the c\llTent theories of unbelief shall have been consigned to that limbus where polytheism and the Ptolemaic astronomy, alchemy, andjudicial astrology lie contemned, the servants of the Cross will be winning larger and yet larger victories for Christ, with the same Gospel which was preached by Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Isaiah, Paul, Augustine and Calvin.- ''Nature Cannot Revolutionize Nature," (1873) in DISCUS­SIONS, Vol. lV, p. 475

Conclusion

Every educated Southern Christian should read Dabney's masterful, insightful and prophetic lecture delivered at the Commence­ment of Hampden Sidney College, June 15, 1882, entitled, "The New South," in DISCUS- ' SIONS, Vol. IV, pp. Iff, if he wants to under­stand how we have come to be where we are today. I leave you with his words of counsel and exhortation to the "young gentlemen" he was addreSSing, for his counsei is as perti­nent today as it was then, if not more so.

First, because "the principles of truth and . 'righteousness are as eternal as their divine Legislator," (p. 16), they must be upheld and defended and applied in every age, regardless of the cost. "Here, in one word, is the safe pole-star for the 'New South;' let them adopt the Scriptural politics ... that righteousness

• • ' } ' __ • o ' •

exalteth a nation, but slu is a reproach to any people. That wisdom and knowledge shall be the stability of the times, and

strength of salvation; the fear of the Lord is His treasure. That he that walketh righteously and speaketh uprightly; .he

, that despiseth the gain of oppressions, that shaketh his' hands from holding bribes, that stoppeth his ears from he.ar­ing of blood, and shutteth his eyes from beholdiug evil; he shall dwell On high; his place of defense shall be the munitions of rocks.

Second, do not succumb to the temptation to BECOME LIKE YOUR CONQUERORS, in order to acquire popularity, ease and influence in their culture. Beware· of making wealth and materialism your idol. "If they [wealth and possessions] be pursued as an end instead of a means, they become your ruin instead of your deliverance. - The only sure wealth of the State is in cultured, heroic men, who intelligently know their duty and are calmly prepared to sacrifice all else, including life, to maintain the right."- p. 17f

Third, do not give in to the temptation to wrap yourself "like a hermit in the folds of

. his own self-respect. - How plausible the argument which says: Let those who have by fraud or force usurped the helm bear the responsibility of wrecking the ship. But the error of this resort is that it neglects the claims of patriotism and robs the State, in the moment of her need, of the virtues and , faculties most essential to her deliverance. - The alternative temptation is yet more seductive to the more supple temperament. This is to exaggerate and pervert the pleas of acquiescence in the inevitable; to cry, 'Oh there is no use nor sense in contending against fate,' and on this argument to act the trimmer and turncoat. How much easier is this, to the pliable temper? .~ Ah, how tiresome is it to such a man to hold up, the standard of principle whenit is unsustained by the breeze of popularity! Poor soul, how his arms ache, and how do they crave rest in the arms of the corrupt majority. But even by the light of that policy .. .it would be better ... still to cleave to moral consistency and principle. - It is the men who have convictIons and ·who cleave lo them, who are the article in demand; in demand even with political adversaries, who, .'themselves, have

28· THE COUNSEL of Chalcedon - October/November, 2000

no principles ."- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 19-20

Fourth, regardless of the heated animosity of an anti-Christian culture, we must see to it that we preserve alJ that is true in the prin­ciples or ennobling in the example of the Christian South. We are told on every hand to bury the past, for the issues of the 1860's are antiquated and of no practical signifi­cance today. Let us forget the passions of the past, we are told. Let us concern our­selves with the issues of today. But Dabney rejoins: "Be sure that the former issues are realJy dead before you bury them! There are issues which cannot die without the death of the people, of their honor, their civilization and their greatness. Take care that you do not bury too much, while burying the dead past... Will you bury true history whose years are those of the God of Truth?"- DISCUS­SIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 20-21

Fifth, we must not alJow "the dominant patty to teach [our children] a perverted history of the past contests. This is a mis­take of which you are in imminent peril. With all the astute activity of their race , our con­querors strain every nerve to preoccupy the ears of all America with the false version of affairs which suits the purposes of their usurpatioJ;l. With a gigantic sweep of men­dacity, this literature aims to falsify or mis­represent everything; the very facts of his­tory, the principles of the former Constitution as admitted in the days of freedom by all statesmen of all parties; the characters and motives of our patriots; the purposes of parties, its very essential names of rights and virtues aJ;ld vices. The whole sway of their commercial and political ascendancy is exerted to fill the South with this false litera­ture. Its sheets come up, like the frogs of

. Egypt, into our houses, our bed chambers, our very kneading troughs. Now, against this deluge of perversions I solemnly warn young men of the South ... - If you would not be mere blunderers iJ;l your new constructions, then you must understand aright the strncture of those recent actions on which they must found themselves. You will seek to learn them, not from a Greeley or a Henry Wilson, but from a Stephens and a Davis. While you

do not allow your judgments to be hood­winked by even the possible exaggerations of our own patriots, still less will you yield your minds to the malignant fables of those parti­sans who think they can construct history as unscrupulously as a political ring. Our age presents the strange instance of a numerous party, who think they can circumvent the resistless forces of truth by systematically misnaming facts and fallacies, who are deliberately building a whole system of empire on the substitution of light for dark­ness and darkness for light, of good for evil and evil for good ... - If you wish to be buried deeper than thrice buried Troy beueath the final mountains of both defeat and shame go with these architects of detraction. They' are but arraying themselves against that unchangeable God who has said: the lying tongue is but for a moment, but the lip of trutb shall be established forever."­DISCUSSIONS, Vol. IV, pp. 21-22. Verses such as these formed the basis for Dabney's optimism about the future. Although he had little hope for the short-run, he was confident that in the long-run the vision and life of truth would prevail.

I cannot lay Dabney down without issuing to you his earnest plea pressing you to com­mit your ways to God through Christ: "On whom will you call, you who have neglected your Savior, when you pass down into this valley of great darkness; when the inexorable veil begins to descend, shutting out human help and sympathy from your despairing eyes; when death thrusts out your wretched soul from its abused tenement; when you launch forth into the void immense, a naked, shiver­ing ghost; when you stand before the great white throne? Can you face those horrors alone? How will you endure a beggared, undone eternity? Can on Christ, then, today, in repentance and faith, in order that you may be entitled to call upon Him in the hour of your extremity. Own Him now as your Lord, that He may confess you then as His people."- Quoted in THE JOURNAL OF CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTION, Vol. XIII, No.2, 1994, p . 347

As J. H. Rice, Jr., spoke of his death, "StonewalJ Jackson ' s chief of staff has

October/November, 2000 - THE COUNSEL ofChalcedon - 29

reported for duty at Headquarters on the shining plains of Heaven!." And in the trib­ute Dr. S. Taylor Martin made of Dabney on January 20, .1898, (after Dabn.ey's death on January 2), he said: "The rapidly vanishing remnant of the old Confederacy mourns the loss of one of the ablest defenders of acaus.e as true and principles as Just as any for which a svwrd was ever drawn or the sacri­fice of human life every made. The Church . of God of all denominations has lost the labors of amigp.ty champion, who with un­swerving fidelity advanced and defended these fundamental truths without which there could.be no. true church,.no religion, no gospel of salvation, no glad tidings, no hope for lost and ruined man."l4

Th~refore, pray that Dabney, though dead, will continue to speak the truth to coming generations, and that they will listen. Pray for men of Dabney ' s caliber to fill the void he left a century ago, whiCh void reinail;ls U,IJ.­

filled.

May we, as Robert L. Dabney, die uncon­quered by the world, and in all our thinking and living stand on the Word of God like a stonewall!

So when a great man dies, For years beyond our ken The light he .leaves behind him lies Upon the paths of men. I Notic;e in this section Dabney's use of Old Testament case­

laws llsapplicable today. He did not hesitate to make the Hebrew Republic· the political-social model for nations today_ For" a thorough discWlsion on this subject see Greg Bahnsen 's books, BY THIS STANDARD and NO OTHER STANDARD.

1 Note Dabney 's use o{ the. Olc;l Testament to defend his view on the" function of civil government. especially in his Scriptural references regarding 'capital punishinent.

3 For DabneY's extensive Biblical exposition on slavery see his book, A DEFENSE OF VIRGINIA AND THE SOUTH, (Harrisonburg, VA: Sprinkle Publications, 1977 reprint, flfst published in I 867).

" Noti~ Dabney:s continued use_ of Old Testament Israe~ as a socio,.pOlitical model' for nations today.

s Ephesians 6:5-9: Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh; with fea~ and trem_ bling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Cbrjst;Dot by way of eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the beart. With,eood will render service, as to the Lord, and not 'to men ... knowing that whatever eood thine each one does, tbis he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free. And, ma.ste~s. do

the same things_ to them', and elve I:lP threatening, knQwing. that both their Master and yours is i. beaven, and there is DO partiality with Him. Colossians 4:1: Masters, arant to your slaves justice and fairness, knowing that yo~ too have a Master in heaven. ' '

6 "Consequently the theory teaches _ that exactly the same surrender must be exacted of each olie under this social contract, whence ~ach individual is inalienably entitled to -1,l11 the same franchises an,d functions in society as well as to his moral equality; so that it is a natural iniquity to withhold from any adult person by law any prerogative which is legally conferred on any other member in society. The equality must be mechanical as well as

, moral, else the society is charged with natural injustice."- Dabney. DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III. p. 500

7 In the_ following quote, notice that Dabney continues to use Old Testament Israel as a ~ocio-political model for nations today.

• In \;is book. A CONSUMING FIRE: THE FALL OF THE CONFEDERACY IN THE MIND OF TIlE WHITE CIIRISTIAN SOUTH, Eugene D. Genovese' writes of the "impressive scholarly efforts" of men like Robert L. Dabney and -James iI. Thornwell to "ground slavery in Scripture." - p. 97

, "When. the Confederat~ States of America sUrr!!ndored at Appomatox, the last nation of the old~r order fell. , So" because: historians like to have set dates 00. which to hang their bats, we may say the first Christendom dled there, in 1865. But the idea of Christendo'm-has not passed away. ~ God's - promise remains. -This means there will be a second Christendom, and if necessary, then a third. - Jesus did not teach us to pray, saying, <Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done' in heaven if-_and 'i'fhen we g"et there.' In His commission He told us to disciple nations. Empowered by the Spirit, this is don'e with the wat~r' of b~ptism and the ' rigorous teaching of the Word. IN oUr prayers" Jesus told us to pray for the heavenly, commonwealth to have an. earthly manifestation. In short, we are ~o pray for Christendom. , These prayers will be answl.ll'ed, so tbis means that the' South will rise again. But this is n_ot said with any regional or national jingoistic fervor. So will New England rise again. So will Scotland. So will the Netherlands. And as the gospel comes to the uttermost regions for the first time, savage tribes will attend His Word. The earth is the Lord's and He will have"it.". Douglas Jones ancl Douglas Wi},oo. ANGELS I;N THE ARCHITECTURE: A PROTESTANT VISION FOR 'MIDDLE EARTIl. (Moscow, Idaho: Canon Press. 1998), pp. 203·205 . .

" LECTIJRES IN SYSTEMAl'IC THEOLOGY, p. 838.

II For a history ~f post.millenniaiism ;~Iee «The Prima 'Facie Acceptability of Postmillennialism," in, Greg Bahnsen's book, VlCTORY IN JESUS: TIlE BRlGIIT HOPE OF POSThULLEN­NIALISM, (Texarkana,' ARK:' Covenant Media Press, 1999), pp: " 53f1. .

12 These words were written in. 1873. In 1871 Dabneyehded his paper, "f.- Caution Against' Ant~-:Christian Scieric~." w~tb similar words: "Centuries bence, ~ ,man shall continue in his preseot stat~ So long, when these current theOries of unbelief shall have been consigned, by a trucr secular ·science, to that limbus where qa.e Ptol~ma_ic astronomy, alc.hemy and judicial astrology, lie; conteruned, the servants of the Cross will be winning target, and . yet larger victories for Christ, with 'th"e sattie -old doctrines preached by Isaiah, by St. Paul,. by Augustine, . by Knox, .by Davies:'- DISCUSSIONS, Vol. III, p. 136

13 ' 1N MEMORIAM, "A Lover of the South" by I.H. Rico, Jr.

14 IN MEMORIAM. I'A Tribute" by S. Taylor Martin," p. 39

30 -.THE (:OUNSEL ofChalcedon· October/November, 2000