An incredibly illuminating essay from John Ehrett on Protestant theological retrieval. Ehrett contrasts two forms of retrieval: one focused more narrowly on specific doctrines (e.g., theology proper, Christology) and an “expanded” form that seeks to retrieve Reformation-era thinking about social and political issues as well (e.g., gender roles, established religion). The “expanded retrieval” camp, which includes many so-called Christian Nationalists, argues that fidelity to the tradition requires closer adherence to the reformers' entire socio-political vision. Ehrett demurs from this expanded view. Here are a few choice quotes:

Reformation-era claims about social and political order are in general more likely to be contingent and time-bound, while [specifically doctrinal claims] are not. […]

Arguments for comprehensive social order are always put forward against a backdrop of certain material and civic conditions. The old logic of households as sites of economic production, for instance, was profoundly unsettled by industrialization and its concomitant changes. Similarly, cultural exchange—and the possibilities for formulating common ground between representatives of different religious traditions—became quite different once global travel and intellectual exchange became easier. To call for a restoration of “Reformational” patterns of social order (on gender roles, religious toleration, or what have you), under circumstances where those patterns would—if revived today—necessarily be disembedded from the material and social context that was operative in the Reformers’ day, is not really to call for a return to tradition, but for the creation of something entirely novel and untried. Background assumptions matter. Hence, it does no good to claim that simply because Luther or Calvin or Althusius said something, that necessarily settles the matter for today. Even assuming the normative force of the Reformers’ teachings, that social configuration which would be instantiated under present conditions if their words were heeded would be fundamentally unlike the pattern of social order the Reformers no doubt envisioned in their own time. (emphasis mine)

What appears, at least at first glance, to be a straightforward essay about the merits of applying the reformers' social teaching to present circumstances ends up widening out to a deeper exploration about tradition and how to debate its enduring relevance. Bravo.