The Reformed Churches liberated in the Netherlands is a Protestant denomination that emerged from the so-called Liberation in 1944 and subsequent years. Many people have wondered how this could happen in the middle of the war. This article discusses the theological backgrounds and the context in which liberation could take place. Anyone who wants to understand the theological backgrounds of liberation can best start with Abraham Kuyper. This preacher, politician and journalist played an important role in the establishment of the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands. An important principle in Kuyper’s theology was that man is accountable only to God and that makes him a sovereign being. He believed that this freedom should be applicable to all areas of life. This led him to the position that every congregation should be able to make independent decisions before God, without being hindered by governments and synods. Calvinism was the basis of democracy.
Sovereignty
He had adopted another concept that would play an important role for Kuyper from Groen van Prinsterer, namely the concept of Sovereignty within one’s own circle. The idea behind this was that there were all kinds of areas of life, such as science, politics and family, that had their own laws laid down by God in creation. Sovereign within that and accountable only to God. The various circles must be separate from church or state interference.
Mean Grace
One of the points on Kuyper was his teaching about Common Grace. Kuyper taught that after the Fall there was still much good left in man. God in his mercy had given another divine light to man. Thanks to God’s general revelation, man still knows what is good. He saw two areas of grace. First, the area of private grace. The church’s actions were only limited to this area. All other grace was included in the domain of ‘Common Grace’, also called ‘Common Grace’. Those areas were separated from each other. Church and State had different callings and different goals. In the public domain, the government could create norms and rules that would lead to good behavior, but the government had no say in how the gospel should reach the people.
Criticism
There was criticism of Kuyper’s position on the church. In the Dutch Confession of Faith in articles 27-29 it is stated that there is a true and a false church. According to Kuyper, this was an outdated position. The confessions were written in the 16th century, and given the tensions between the Protestant and Roman Catholic churches at the time, this formulation was understandable. But since then, in addition to the Reformed, there have been the Lutherans and the Episcopalians, so the position has become untenable, according to him. According to him, most churches complement each other. And only in that totality is fullness.
Emancipation process
At the same time as the rise, culminating in his premiership from 1901 to 1905, and decline, the emancipation process also took place. The Reformed had separated from the Reformed Church in 1834 and 1886 and had grown from a minority group into a self-confident, well-organized movement with coherent visions and areas for all areas of life. Within the Reformed Churches, no one could ignore Kuyper. It remained that way almost until his death. There was no successor of its size. Hendrik Colijn, prime minister of five cabinets in the 1930s, was indeed the central figure within the Reformed Churches, but had little involvement in church theology.
Consolidation
Already in recent years under Kuyper, and certainly under Colijn, a climate of consolidation has emerged. The ARP’s election slogan in 1925, Keep what we have, stood in a broader context than just the impending recession. Kuyper himself seems to have been aware of the fact that the emancipation of the Reformed population had been successful. Shortly before his death he wrote the speech, which he never delivered himself, What Now?
Declaration
The desire to ‘keep what we have’ led to a lot of traditionalism and conformism. In response, a counter-movement is emerging from many ‘young’ theologians who are rallying against the conformism of the ARP and the elite of the Reformed Churches. However, the spirit of renewal was not widely supported and in 1920 the synod of the church issued a warning against the erosion of faith and degeneration of morals. This statement is read from the pulpit of all churches.
Geelkerken
However, not everyone feels addressed, and the underlying current comes to the surface during a conflict surrounding the Amsterdam pastor Geelkerken. Influenced by historical criticism, he states in a sermon that the serpent from Genesis did not speak literally. A churchgoer smelled trouble and assumed that Geelkerken did not consider the story of creation to be true. Geelkerken himself makes a distinction between ‘divine announcement of a historical fact’ and all kinds of details surrounding it. However, it is enough for the synod to suspend him. Supported by his church council, Geelkerken asks for a discussion about a broader Reformed view of Scripture. This request is rejected. However, his church council allows him to preach anyway. Geelkerken is then completely cordoned off. The church council is suspended, but the church decides to leave the church and is followed in the years that follow by 24 other churches, and many individual members who cannot find space within the Reformed Churches with a drive for innovation. Ultimately, this group rejoins the Reformed Church.
Church law
One of the most important topics of discussion during this time concerned the issue of ‘old and new church law’. The ‘old’ church law meant that authority lies with the local municipality. This also offered an opportunity for resistance in the Geelkerken issue. However, the synod had removed the church council and the pastor, which gave much more power to the multiple assemblies than before12.
Exterior
On the outside, things seem quiet in the following years. Reformed life continues and with Hendrik Colijn as Reformed Prime Minister of five cabinets, things seem to be going well for the Reformed. However, there is a lot of swell beneath the surface. In the 1930s a new criticism emerged. The Reformation movement was wary of ‘mysticism’ and ‘subjectivism’. By this they were referring mainly to the doctrine of election, which assumed that salvation was granted to one person but not to another through some kind of Divine arbitrariness.
Baptism
A discussion that took place during this time was a discussion surrounding baptism. Many theologians thought they discovered two lines in the Bible surrounding baptism. First, the line of sovereignty of God. He chooses and elects whom He wills. That has everything to do with predestination. On the other hand, there is the line that God has promised to be the God of all believers. In 1905 the synod had declared that the children of believers also belong to the covenant people, until the contrary proves. The text was a compromise text. This statement was objected to, because the opponents believed that man is saved on the basis of God, that their hearts will be renewed, and that it does not depend on man’s obedience to faith. The weakness of the position, however, was that all children receive baptism. received, without knowing whether they are saved. A second weakness is that if this model is correct, the logical theological idea is that once a person is chosen it does not matter what he does. Various solutions were devised for the problem, such as ‘supposed rebirth’. It went like this. We do not know whether someone is saved, that must be evident from his life, but then we can certainly baptize him.
Painter
All this was a thorn in the side of the Reformed Movement. One of the most important spokespersons for this movement was the preacher and professor Klaas Schilder. He focused on the covenant itself. Man need only obey the covenant, and furthermore he need not worry about supposed ‘rebirth’ or predestination.
Learning decisions
In 1936 the synod decided to discuss the points in detail, including, among other things, the doctrine of Common Grace and the pluralism of the church. One problem was that the battle was quite heated and when supporters and opponents started talking to each other, they continued their polemic at the same time. In 1942, a number of teaching decisions were made that were again protested, but the discussion continued to focus on baptism and the covenant.
WWII
A second problem was that the Second World War had broken out and Schilder was either captured or had to go into hiding from the Germans, and at a later stage a publication ban was imposed. In the meantime, the synod approved all controversial doctrines. Several church councils rejected this bond. Schilder also did not agree. Many, including Schilder and Prof. Greijdanus, another central figure within the Reformed Churches, were suspended and deposed.
Article 31
This also made the discussion surrounding church law topical again, because according to the objectors, the authority to depose the pastor did not lie with the synod, but with the local community. They relied on article 31 of the Dordrecht church order. According to Schilder, this church doctrine had to be combated as false doctrine. That is why people sometimes talk jokingly about the Article 31 churches.
Liberation
On August 11, 1944, in the midst of the violence of war, Schilder read the ‘Act of Liberation or Reconciliation’ in the Lutheran church of The Hague. It became separation. Thousands of Reformed people followed Schilder and his followers. Twelve percent of all church members, approximately sixty thousand people, would leave the Reformed Church and exchange it for the new church association. Many local congregations and sometimes entire families were torn apart. Some prisoners or prisoners who returned from captivity during the war in Germany found a completely changed living environment where neighbors did not greet each other because they belonged to the other church.
Answer
There was never a good satisfactory answer as to why the separation was necessary now. Some, of course, especially the liberated, blame it on theology and the view on baptism and covenant, and the church view. But a lot was also pointed in the direction of Schilder and his attitude and intolerant tone. Herman Ridderbos synod member and colleague of Schilder at the Theological University Kampen would later explain about the Liberation: ,It is terrible what happened then, but what I apparently have difficulty getting across to people is: Schilder maneuvered us into a situation where we do the most., But it must be said that there was also a lot of polemic from the other side.
Liberation
Another factor was undoubtedly the war itself. Only the fact that the lines of communication were difficult and in many cases, for example, not available at all with imprisoned ministers. The atmosphere and resistance against the Germans may also have played a role. In the context of the occupation, it is possible that the resistance of Schilder and others took on an enormous extra dimension. The liberation was possibly an act of resistance and the liberation would have been seen as a double liberation, from the occupier and the synod.
Conclusion
All in all, it can be concluded that there are various reasons behind the liberalization. In part these are theological reasons. For another part, the cause must be seen more in the context of the Second World War and the context of life in the Reformed Church. A third cause must be sought in the behavior and character of certain people.