Donald Sinnema is one of the world’s leading authorities on the Synod of Dordt. He has published much on Dordt through the years and was a general editor of Acta det Documenta Synodi Nationalis Dordrechtanae 1618–1619, which featured all the documents of Dordt in their original languages in ten volumes.
The Synod was called to settle the theological disputes between Arminians and the Reformed in the Dutch church. Through exacting theological debates, the result was five Canons (referred to as CD) or Articles that supported the theological position of the Reformed over the Arminians – and these became the standard for the Dutch Reformed Church and an enduring standard for Reformed views of key theological issues.
This volume features sixteen chapters of Sinnema’s writings, some modified for this collection. Three appendices: Overview of Dordt’s Sessions, Editions of the Canons, and a Bibliography of Sinnema Writings make this book an authoritative source for nearly “all things Synod of Dordt”!
The strengths of this book are notable. It provides a single source for Dordt studies from a veteran historian and offers the complete convenience of being able to access numerous dimensions of the Synod in one place. Sinnema’s revisions and expansions of earlier writings assure this volume is up to date through Sinnema’s seasoned judgments and assessments. This enables the book to be looked at with trust. It presents the best current scholarship.
Along the way, the author makes historical – and theological judgments. These relate to historical questions, issues, or assessments. But Sinnema also addresses the theological issue of what he calls “Distortions of the Canons: The Tilenus Abbreviation, the Five Points of Calvinism, and TULIP” (ch. 16).
The first of these refers to theology professor Daniel Tilenus’s five-point abbreviation of the Canons, which “had a lasting influence in fostering a harsh interpretation of the document, especially in Calvinist-Arminian debates within English-language circles” (415). Tilenius wrote several pieces, including a sharp critique of the Canons, summarizing each of them in five short articles – of one long sentence each – which became “the basis for interpreting the CD in later Calvinist-Arminian debates” (421). Sinnema’s view is that “Tilenus drew up his abbreviation not simply from the CD but also from summaries of Reformed views as presented in Arminian writings. As such, the five articles of Tilenius’s abbreviation are not a fair representation of the actual formulations of the CD; rather, they offer an interpretation with a clear Arminian bias” (421). Sinnema details later developments and also the 1831 assessment by Josiah Allport that the Abbreviations were “a garbled statement and a deliberate falsehood that was cloaked as a ‘favorable abridgement’ of the CD” (426).
Dordt was convened “first of all to address the controversy with the Arminians, focusing on the Five Articles of their 1610 Remonstrance” (426). The Synod promulgated its Five Articles in five chapters or heads…. “It soon became customary to say that the CD presented ‘Five Points,’ referring to the topics of the five chapters” (426).
In the early eighteenth century, the full phrase “The Five Points of Calvinism” appeared. In the early nineteenth century, the five concepts were mentioned together. At the end of the century, Philip Schaff identified “the five points of Dutch Calvinism” – his list reflecting the order of the CD.
However, Sinnema finds a twofold problem with the phrase. The first is that “Calvinist theology is much broader and richer than five points, and Calvinism cannot be reduced to five points” (428). The five points are “only the five-point response of the CD to the Remonstrant Five Articles in controversy. They only cover a specific group of doctrines centered on soteriology that were at the heart of the controversy with the Remonstrants” (428). Second, “Calvin was not the unqualified source of the Five Points as presented in the CD. He was not the single fountainhead of the Reformed tradition. Other Reformed theologians have influenced aspects of the CD to an equal or greater extent” (428). This point is also developed fully in another Sinnema essay: “Calvin and the Canons of Dordt” (ch. 11).
The third issue Sinnema cites in “Distortions of the Canons” is TULIP. This is the famous description of the Canons and even “the heart of Reformed theology.” The acronym is drawn from the first letters of five theological points, relating to the Canons: Total depravity, Unconditional election, Limited atonement, Irresistible grace, and Perseverance of the saints – serving as a mnemonic and pedagogical tool.
However, Sinnema finds difficulties. The first is that the earliest known reference to TULIP is in 1905, from Dr. Cleland Boyd McAfee, a Presbyterian pastor in Brooklyn who used the acronym in a popular lecture on the Five Points of Calvinism before the Presbyterian Union of Newark, New Jersey. McAfee’s form was “somewhat fluid,” says Sinnema (430), and it was not until Loraine Boettner’s The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination (1932) that things standardized a bit – though Boettner spoke of “T” as “Total Inability” and of “I” as “Efficacious Grace.” By the 1950’s, TULIP had assumed its present form.
Sinnema lists eight reasons why there are difficulties. These include: TULIP only works in English-language contexts; only “P” is explicitly found in the CD; the proper order of the five points alters the proper order found in the CD; the acronym distorts the full meaning of the CD; the acronym sometimes defines what it means to be Reformed; the acronym “oversimplifies and distorts the nuanced teaching of the CD” (431).
This rich book provides unmatched historical detail with theological discussions, making it a wonderfully welcome resource. We are grateful for this book and for the devoted labors of Donald Sinnema!
