The Philosophy of Religion of Alexander Campbell

Preface

Preface I will never forget my first encounter with W. David Baird, that great Oklahoman dean who recruited me to Pepperdine University in 2007. Toward the end of our negotiations, he squeezed my hand, looked me square in the eye, and with all the gravity in the world said, “Barton W. Stone and Alexander Campbell are calling you from the grave to come to Pepperdine.” I confess, Baird’s otherworldly intercession nearly doubled me over in laughter. But I suspect that it also planted something of a seed in the back of my mind, even if (as I would later find out) I was hardly the first person to whom Baird had relayed this summons-from-beyond. So began my scholarly interest in Alexander Campbell. At previous stages in my career, I could never have predicted that I would write a book about Campbell’s philosophy of religion. For one thing, until just a few years ago, most of my research had centered on issues in social and political philosophy and classical American pragmatism. And like most other people—even many of us affiliated with the Stone-Campbell Restoration Movement—I had no clue that Campbell had much of anything to say about philosophy of religion as opposed to, say, theology or biblical interpretation. But because I found myself working at an institution to which I had apparently been called by Campbell himself (an amusing thought, I admit), it seemed only fitting that I should reacquaint myself with his work. And because I have always been drawn to the give and take of a formal debate, I started by thumbing through the transcript of Campbell’s eight-day exchange with skeptic Robert Owen over the evidences of Christianity. While reading this debate, I eventually concluded that I had stumbled upon something that was not only historically intriguing but also potentially unique, at least as far as natural theology goes. On the first pass, I was tempted to view Campbell’s case for God’s existence—the one he showcased in the Owen debate—as little more than a rewarmed version of Descartes’s so-called trademark argument. But the more I looked at it, the more I noticed that my initial impression was not quite accurate . For starters, Campbell clearly fancied himself a bit of a Lockean empiricist, and Descartes’s trademark argument goes hand in hand with his rationalism. So, x Preface alas, my curiosities were unleashed, and I went in search of what scholars had to say about this unfamiliar argument for God’s existence and about Campbell’s philosophy of religion more generally. But aside from a few cursory treatments of his philosophical views, I returned from the library virtually empty-handed. This book is effectively my attempt to write what I was hoping to discover when I went looking. And if I may torture a line from Santayana: should readers be tempted to smile when they find this book, I assure them that I smile right along with them. At the least, I hope that this book provides a decent enough starting place for those who are curious about whether there is anything in Campbell’s philosophical thinking to smile upon. Admittedly, in many respects, this book raises more questions than I set out to answer here. But I trust that it is nonetheless an evenhanded, albeit critical, treatment of Campbell’s philosophy of religion and that it points readers in the right direction for finding some satisfying answers— or, at any rate, that it raises the right sorts of philosophical questions to which Campbell and his followers should attend. Many people have been helpful to me in the process of writing this book, and I owe them a great debt of gratitude. For their insightful comments on parts (or the whole) of this book, I thank Jon Atkins, John Mark Hicks, Michael Hodges, Mason Marshall, Kraig Martin, Garrett Pendergraft, Rubel Shelly, and the reviewers and editors at the University of Tennessee Press. I am also especially grateful to my former students Jacob Perrin and Peter Zuk for their comments on the manuscript, for their help editing the notes and bibliography, and for all their work as my research assistants. For helpful conversations about several points covered in this book or for their helpful historical tips along the way, I thank Scott Aikin, David Baird, Michael Ditmore, Chris Doran, Ron Highfield, Loretta Hunnicutt, Mark Wiebe, John Wilson, and Darryl Tippens. For their research assistance to me...