Recovering Theological Education — Part 5: Modern Seminary Era

1840–Present | Seminary

Primary Theological Educational Method: Denominational Institutional

From University Theology to Seminary Dominance

From the mid-nineteenth century until today, seminaries and post-graduate university study have been the primary mode of ministerial theological training. Beginning with twelfth-century Scholasticism through the Reformation, theological education maintained a prominent place in the universities of Europe.¹ However, during the eighteenth-century Enlightenment, secular university leadership began to question the place of Christian theology in the universities. As universities increasingly became places where rationalism, empiricism, and other human perspectives challenged the authority of Scripture and theology, theological study within the universities encountered a crisis of academic acceptance and relevance.² Fearing marginalization, Friedrich Schleiermacher, a prominent German theologian at the University of Berlin, popularized a rational or objective approach to theological study.³ The theological departments of Harvard and Yale soon adopted this rationalism-influenced method of scientific or historical-critical inquiry.⁴ Today, theological study in secular universities remains little more than critical analysis through textual criticism and historical observation, offering little biblical instruction to the student and minimal benefit to the local church.

Today, theological study in secular universities remains little more than critical analysis through textual criticism and historical observation, offering little biblical instruction to the student and minimal benefit to the local church.

Andover and the Shift Back to the Academy

The first seminary in the United States, Andover Theological Seminary, adopted elements of the post-graduate university structures of Europe. However, the intentions of the founders were pure. With a desire to train the next generation of church practitioners and missionaries, the conservative Congregational church of New England founded Andover as an alternative to the liberal classrooms of Harvard.⁵ The goal of the early denominational seminaries, much like their antecedents in the sixteenth-century Reformation, was to train pastors in practical, exegetically-sound preaching.⁶ By 1900, denominational seminaries had multiplied to more than 150 theological schools in the United States.⁷ The shift from private post-graduate theological training to an institutional academic structure began with Anodver, moving theological education back to the academy.

With a desire to train the next generation of church practitioners and missionaries, the conservative Congregational church of New England founded Andover as an alternative to the liberal classrooms of Harvard.

Strengths and Limits of the Seminary Model

While seminaries provide unique and exceptional opportunities for advanced theological study, their academic structures present challenges. As Hershael York wisely states, “Seminaries…offer a depth of theological training in multiple disciplines,” therefore, “Churches have the right to delegate a portion of that training to a seminary.”⁸ Nevertheless, the seminary model, influenced by the university, often lacks life-on-life tutorship and on-the-job training that remains essential to ministerial development.⁹

“Seminaries…offer a depth of theological training in multiple disciplines,” therefore, “Churches have the right to delegate a portion of that training to a seminary.”

Seminaries Between Church and Academy

The seminary model represents a denominational-owned institutional approach to theological education. The denominational accountability that exists in most seminaries maintains closer accountability to the church than the theological departments of secular universities. Nevertheless, seminaries straddle two worlds: the academy and the church.¹⁰ The curricular plan within many seminary degree programs often results in the compartmentalization of theology, lacking applicational reflection. Rather than shaping elders as shepherds of the Word for the church, the seminary’s academic program may result in out-of-touch theological specialists who lack the skills of a pastoral practitioner. The academic rigor of the seminary, although an aid, remains insufficient to qualify a man for ministerial work.

Nevertheless, seminaries straddle two worlds: the academy and the church.

Evaluation

An analysis of theological education in the Seminary Era, when evaluated against the rubric used in this study, reveals strengths and weaknesses. While seminaries often have denominational oversight, the accountability and locus of the training remain outside of the local church, resulting in susceptibility to doctrinal and missional error.

Community-oriented peer learning opportunities are often vibrant within the residential structures of the seminary. However, as hybrid and fully online seminary training programs grow, opportunities for in-person community decreases.¹¹ A biblically focused curriculum within seminaries remains contingent on the orthodoxy of the administration and faculty. Historical evidence reveals that, eventually, seminary orthodoxy gives way to liberalism. Theological practicality within institutional education stands as a clear deficiency of seminaries, requiring local church involvement in every facet of theological study to remedy. Additionally, traditional seminaries are out-of-church-context, thus often out-of-reach and ill-equipped to facilitate the ongoing educational program for elder and ministry leadership training. While seminaries are valuable, they are inadequate alone to complete the task of theological education.

While seminaries are valuable, they are inadequate alone to complete the task of theological education.

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