Originally Posted by Robin
So, question:

Does the Renihan presentation represent "republication?"

nope Their paper is on 'baptism' specifically and is not a defense of "Republication/Two Kingdom" theology. I am sure I didn't imply they did. However, what I did at least try to suggest is part of their underlying view of the covenant is at best influenced by what Kline taught and what is being taught openly at WSC. They hold, for example, that circumcision was a 'national' sign and had basically nothing to do with a spiritual sign of the covenant of grace. This is one of the major points of contention between credobaptists and paedobaptists. It smacks of a dispensational hermeneutic.

Originally Posted by Robin
It never uses that word, and I don't think Renihan has suggested anything like it. The fact of two "kingdoms" (one earthly /geographical / racial / political, and the other eternal, universal, spiritual) is obvious even to a casual reader of the bible. As is the fact that there are the two Testaments (covenants), one prefiguring the other.
Again, I never suggested that the Renihan's paper was overtly a defense of "Republicaiton". To iterate, the Klinian view of the covenant is at least in part what undergirds their view of baptism; a clear, and I believe unwarranted, discontinuity between the nation of Israel and the Church and the old covenant and the new covenant. I repeat once again... the major division between credos and paedos is the matter of continuity vs. discontinuity. I hold that there are NOT "two covenants" but only ONE; the Covenant of Grace, which was revealed progressively under different administrations throughout biblical history. There is an unbroken relationship (continuity) of God's eternal decree and covenant with the Son, applied in time through Christ, and revealed to man from Genesis through Revelation.

They give lip-service to some continuity but at the end of the line, they and most Baptists hold that the "Old Covenant" is just that... OLD. And the "New Covenant" is mostly if not all NEW with little if any association with the old.


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simul iustus et peccator

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