If anyone thinks that our subject was chosen in a forced manner, simply because K. Schilder should receive praise as a master of all weaponry of theological science, he is quite mistaken.

And should anyone think that this subject was somehow chosen in order to please myself as a lecturer, he is also wrong.

In this year of 1990 we remember collectively the person who was born in 1890, almost a century ago. The churches have come to know this person, Klaas Schilder, as an author of Scriptural reflections, as a preacher, and as of 1934 as a dogmatist. The teaching of dogmatics or doctrinal theology was his given task. This became his pulpit. Here he was in his right environment. It was there that his God and Father made him into a person of significance whom the people of the church learned to esteem and to love.

Someone may venture to interject, “Yes – but wasn’t Schilder also an exegete, powerful in the Scriptures?” Well, brother or sister, that depends on what you mean by it. ‘KS’ (as he became known by his initials) had an open ear and an attentive eye for the proper exegesis. But whether he was a professional in the strict sense of the word? No, he was not. We do not detract from his merits. He himself would have been the last one to count himself among, let alone on a par with, those who were considered the experts of the trade in his day. Exegesis is a unique profession and the practitioners who understand the art of it are quite rare. In my opinion, the beauty of Schilder’s work is that he made use of the results of the work of the men of the profession wherever he could, in order to share their findings in his own studies and his life’s work. Then you will know that the Reformed Churches during the first decades of our 20^th century were blessed with a number of men of repute in this field, whose names I will mention: M. and A. Noordtzij, C. van Gelderen, G.Ch. Aalders, and J. Ridderbos; or in the New Testament subjects S. Greijdanus and F.W. Grosheide. The practice of the exegesis held strong promise for that of dogmatics. For after all, the dogmatist is concerned in his own way with Scripture. This is the source from which the old truths, but also new ones, as yet unnoticed facets of it, well up for him. KS was such a dogmatist. The writings that he left us bear abundant witness to this.

1. This time, however, we want to pay attention to K. Schilder and the Old Testament. The meaning that this part of the Scriptures had for him is, for those who give it some thought, a treasure-trove. What kind of a person was he as a child of God? Even at a young age, this pensive youth, with his intense, rich life of thought and mind, experienced and was shaped by the whole world around him in all its variegated diversity. As a child of his heavenly Father, he struggled to process this comprehensive world in his mind and spirit and to make it his own. Can or should a child of God do this? Does it have value? That was not really a question for him: after all, it is Father’s world. That world is beautiful because the Father is magnificent. As he became acquainted with that colourful and bizarre world in the form of literature and art in all its expressions, he also learned to differentiate and to judge critically (krinein in Greek), and he developed his well-known critical talent, which made him ask again and again: What is from God? And what is of man, or rather, of the abyss? It was characteristic of KS –and here we see a striking difference from the previous generation– that he was convinced that we again need to take the created world entirely seriously, as being the work of God: the skies, the land and seas, the earth and rocks, plants and animals, and finally mankind. Did sin intervene? That is true–and the consequences are disastrous. KS also gave proper attention to sin. But that does not diminish the truth that the creatures of God are and remain God’s creation. They should not and cannot run away from their given position: a thoroughly Schilderian thought. When we put it this way we are already right into our topic: KS and the Old Testament. For what part of the Bible so persuades us of this fundamental truth as the Old Testament does? Not only because in this part of the Bible, in the first chapters, creation is described to us as an act of God, but no less so because the entire Old Testament continues to build upon this foundation of creation across all its pages. That is the great presupposition. Imagine for a moment that creation is gone–if that were possible–then the Old Testament would no longer be the Old Testament… and the New would not be the New Testament! Even a small child who hears the Biblical account realizes that the Old Testament does not leave us afloat somewhere in “the higher spheres,” as mere spirits or as shadowy beings, but it gives us a foundation to keep both feet on solid ground, as it was walked on by the feet of Adam and Eve, Abraham and Sarah, Moses and Zipporah, David and Abigail and so on. That is the ground floor that God has laid beneath all of us. ‘Floor’: it is a typical Schilderian expression.

 The Old Testament must have been of special interest to Schilder, precisely because the world depicted there, the created world, was the stage on which all those accounts took place. What I say sounds very ordinary, a truism, a self-evident fact. Fine, but sometimes it needs to be stated. Those who knew him or who have read his books will immediately recognize one of the basic motives of his thinking and his theology. They will understand why this man chose the position he did in the conflict surrounding Dr. J. Geelkerken in 1926. This was not just to show that ‘Geelkerken is a heretic; I am a Reformed man; I am on the right side.’ But, as he writes in: “A thrust against Assen?”: “The issue discussed in Assen concerned a conflict between Dr. Geelkerken and the Reformed churches–i.e., between Dr. Geelkerken and this ‘Reformed minister’– about the question of actual history versus “higher reality”; about the question of history vs. ‘a disrobed narrative”’; about the question of reality in time and space, vs. a symbolic representation.” For Schilder, it is not just a matter of: ‘did Genesis 3 really happen or not’. No, if this is history, then for him the word ‘history’ receives its own weight that leads him to further conclusions when he has thought it through scientifically.

Those who hold this view also understand that this man, as one of the first in his day, needed to and did confront the well-known dialectical theology of Karl Barth and his supporters, both outside and within the Netherlands, who also operated from a distinction between “ordinary” history, which he called, in short, “history” and another which he called “super history.” In Barth’s framework, these two stand in opposition to each other. What takes place in the latter has no place in the lower history. Because eternity and time, heaven and earth, God and man, stand opposed like life and death, and thus as irreconcilable enemies. The eternal and heavenly God can only say ‘no’ to the temporary, earthly reality. Not just against sin – we believe that too, but against creation! In no way can he bind himself to it; “to become a procedural factor within the coherence of historically given things” to use KS’s own words. From on high he is only able to make the thunder rumble that terrifies us; or as the lightning, vertically from above, strike this earth, striking it in an instant and leaving a void.

What does this error of Barth have to do with the Old Testament? Everything! Where is it so clear as right there in the Old Testament that “human history forms a ‘window’ in which God’s Word, spoken or heard, can be recorded, perceived or described in all the relationships of our life”: “And the LORD appeared to Abraham”; “And God spoke to Moses”; “and the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah”! How Schilder warned tirelessly against Barth’s fatal distinction between the Word according to its temporary form (the Bible in your living room or wherever) and “its eternal ‘gehalt’ (content)”, where we humans will never get our hands on it or be able to consult it.

2. History in the Old Testament also means–and here we touch upon another important moment in the life and work of KS–having an open eye for progression, the advancement that is characteristic of time and therefore also of history. This is what we also call the redemptive-historical moment. In his opinion, this is what we need to pay attention to time and again in our treatment of biblical history. Because all those accounts and events from the Old Testament took place in different stages of a certain era or in periods that were separated by centuries, any moment of time needed to be taken into account, needed to be placed within the framework of God’s revelation. As KS used to say, “What time is it on the clock of world history?” ” ...on God’s clock”?

These represented unusual sounds in the 1920s. A new sound was heard. Many were suspicious of it: what kind of novelty is this? But many others allowed themselves to be taught and stimulated by this Scripture scholar by the grace of God, who did not want to shy away from any effort, but was happy to go to any lengths to capture and to pass on the message of the Scriptures for today as purely as possible from the revelation that was thousands of years old. Nineteen centuries before Christ (the time period of Abraham) or 1400 years (Moses) or 1000 (David) or 600 (Jeremiah), or the nineteenth or twentieth century after Christ: that makes a big difference! Almost carelessly we mention the name of Christ, the Saviour. Not so Schilder! With him that name, also when it concerns a timetable, received its own significant weight. The incarnation of the Word became for him the central moment of time and the point of orientation in the treatment of all other history from the Bible. All these accounts and histories are part of the one history of which Christ forms the centre.

Here we stand at the cradle of what became known in the 1930s as the redemptive-historical preaching, which has been of such inestimable importance in bringing the Old Testament back to life.

Was Schilder an Old Testament specialist? Not in the sense of serving in a professional role, in other words, as someone who teaches exegesis or writes commentaries. But he had been working with this part of the Bible according to its own nature and place in such a way, that full justice was done to the intention of this part of God’s revelation, such that the Old Testament has regained a place of honour in the life of the church. Professional Old Testament scholars may gain much from it.

3. Should the Old Testament then necessarily have a special, honorary place in the thoughts and life of the church? Yes–not at the expense of the New, but in the closest connection with it. The LORD JESUS showed us how to respect and honour the Old Testament, which to him were the Scriptures that testified about him. However much of the shadowy laws and OT worship has been abolished–for time has progressed; we are living A.D., after Christ–it does not diminish its character as the Word of God, clothed with majesty. The Old Testament as such has not been abolished.

Anyone who browses through Schilder’s meditations on the Scriptures and through his sermons will discover once again how this man has been involved with God’s ancient Word so that it would come to life for the reader of today in its lasting and present significance. Here he found strong support for his thoughts about God’s covenant with his people–and thus with the children of these people. Perhaps you are now also thinking of the church struggle of the 1940s. Schilder did not seek that fight. He only wanted people to think along with him about the depths of God’s revelation. When the struggle was imposed upon him, he did not avoid it.

This covenant represented to him a very serious matter (in Dutch: blood-serious). In his reflections on Genesis 15 he saw the avenue of blood as laid out by God in Abraham’s animals that had been cut in halves.

In other considerations he taught us that we are legal entities before God, which entails rights and obligations for us. The LORD addresses us in the place/position where we (should) stand. While man would sometimes prefer to crawl away, to be forgotten or to disappear into nothingness, the LORD teaches us that we must take him and therefore ourselves seriously. That is why he sometimes puts his people through a trial! God calls out to his people ‘Testify against me!’ And he invites us, ‘Come, let us judge together!’ (See 1 Sam. 12:3.)

It was Schilder who began to measure the Biblical figures and persons in history by their task as office-bearers–their place before the LORD. He showed us the leaders of Judah and the king in Jerusalem as the king ‘coram Deo,’ before the LORD, the theocratic King. It is precisely this that brings about the tension in these ancient histories, which makes them relevant in more ways than one for our present time. Yes, the world powers of those days have not escaped his attention, as becomes clear from a Scripture meditation on Isaiah 10:15–a very topical chapter, which unfortunately is still so little known to us. This meditation appeared just at the time when our country and people had been conquered by the world power of the 1930s and 1940s–a courageous act!

The Old Testament is absolutely topical for our times. He whom we commemorate this day convinced us of this timeliness in his own way, based on his childlike and strong faith in the God of the Scriptures. As we look back on this rich, well-spent life, it once again comes to life for us. Let us get to work with that Old Testament.

Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. Hebrews 13:7