In his work on the understudied Augustus Hopkins Strong, John Aloisi argues (as the title suggests) that Strong struggled to reconcile Christian theology with modern thought. No biographer has covered Strong's life or theology in any great detail. Therefore, Aloisi offers a valuable contribution to understanding Strong and the evolving tensions in American Christianity prior to the fundamentalist and modernist controversy. According to Aloisi, the key to understanding Strong's theology is his emphasis on ethical monism. Even though Strong himself claimed ethical monism to be the centrepiece of his thought, most authors overlook this significance – an oversight Aloisi has remedied. Ethical monism was the outcome of Strong's commitment to orthodoxy wedded to his embrace of philosophical idealism. Aloisi defines Strong's ethical monism as ‘an ontological monism coupled with a personal pluralism’ (p. 3). Ultimately, orthodox and liberal theologians rejected Strong's creative harmonisation of God's transcendence and immanence.
Aloisi's introduction sketches the need to dive more deeply into Strong's theology. Other scholars have noted the importance of Strong as an influential figure in the Northern Baptist Convention, but research has been divided on Strong's role as liberal or conservative. Aloisi argues that the better approach is to recognise Strong as a man of contradictions held together by his articulation of ethical monism. In his early life, Strong began to realise ‘the awfulness of guilt and the unchanging holiness of God’ (p. 9). He matriculated at Yale College in 1853 and had his religious awakening after his junior year. Committing himself to ministry, Strong attended Rochester Seminary and entered the pastorate before returning as president and professor at Rochester when he was only thirty-five years old. Aloisi notes that philosophers on both sides of the Atlantic were already shaping Strong's understanding of divine immanence.
Aloisi continues his study of Strong by introducing the main intellectual influences on his theology. While demonstrating that direct philosophical influence is notoriously tricky, Aloisi substantiates the influence of various idealists on Strong's thought by examining the references in successive editions of Strong's Systematic theology. Strong's ethical monism, therefore, is a distinctive element to theology and ‘a new shade that Strong added to the philosophical idealist's palette’ (p. 45). The concept of monism was not entirely new, but Strong's ethical monism is the result of his critique of certain idealist arguments and the incorporation of other theological ideas. This innovation was ‘the sort of Copernican revolution that needed to be embraced by the Christian community’ (p. 57). Strong faced plenty of opposition when he published his new ideas. But he believed he was reconciling the modern findings of science and philosophy with the orthodox truths of original sin and God as the grounding existence of all reality – with Christ as the first cause. A popular criticism of Strong's ethical monism was the implication that it eliminated all distinction between God and humans and led to moral indifference. Strong accused his critics of understanding his position as pantheistic monism rather than ethical monism.
A common theme that Aloisi recognises in Strong's life is the reciprocal nature of his development of ethical monism and other aspects of theology. Aloisi documents the changes in Strong's writings on Scripture, experience, evolution, miracles and atonement. To Strong, the gaps left in these questions were resolved if reality was understood according to his ethical monism. Contemporary liberals and conservatives disagreed. Aloisi points out that both aisles noticed incongruity in Strong's theology. Liberal theologians believed Strong had ‘taken a few steps in the right direction but needed to throw off the traces of orthodoxy that lingered in his theology’, while conservatives hoped that Strong would return to a ‘more consistent form of orthodoxy’ (p. 109). Aloisi concludes that both sides were correct and that Strong's ethical monism did not blend with Evangelical theology. Strong's thought, while ‘both creative and ambitious’, failed (p. 113).
The greatest strength of Aloisi's illuminating work is his refusal to categorise Strong into a preconceived box as a liberal or conservative. Strong believed himself to be a ‘pillar of orthodoxy’, but Aloisi guides the reader through Strong's own theological development and contemporary controversies to show that he was a man of contradictions. Aloisi bolsters his overall thesis that Strong was a man who failed to harmonise modern thought with orthodoxy through his innovative ethical monism. This examination of Strong's life – which places ethical monism as the centre of his thought – helps us to understand how contemporaries, and Strong himself, understood his life and influence. Before scholars draw any conclusions about Strong as a conservative or liberal, or assume that Strong's ideas are secondary to understanding his life, they should consult Aloisi.
While the argument of this book is easy to follow, Aloisi occasionally stumbles in explaining what exactly ethical monism was and how it relates to the specific areas of doctrine. While the influence is no doubt the key to understanding Strong's theology, defining it is more difficult and readers may leave the work knowing ethical monism's significance, but left confused on what exactly it is. However, that could be due to the complexity of German idealism in general. Overall, Aloisi has broadened our understanding of the nuance of American Christianity's crisis between orthodoxy and modern thought.
