Biblical interpretation is a complex and weighty process. Arguing that ahistoricism partially underpins attempts to redefine key Christian doctrines today by no means implies the authority of historical teachings over the Bible or that Christians never reinterpret Scripture passages.

The church is always situated in a cultural context. Ever since the early church, Christians have grappled with how to speak the gospel into culture and become all things to all people while remaining true to biblical teachings.

And yet contemporary Western societies have largely lost their meaningful engagement with, and connection to, history. This has left them disconnected from the full scope of the cultural context of the church. I have coined the term “Ahistoric Age” to identify the way in which this plays out.

There are five major characteristics of the Ahistoric Age:

1. We believe that the past is merely a source of shame and oppression from which we must free ourselves.
2. We no longer think of ourselves as part of historical communities.
3. We’re increasingly ignorant of history.
4. We don’t believe history has a narrative or a purpose.
5. We’re unable to reason well and disagree peaceably about the ethical complexities of the past—the coexistence of good and evil in the same historical figure or episode.

When I discuss the effects of ahistoricism in the church, I’m not suggesting we need to reject contemporary culture completely and simply reembrace everything we did in the past, as if the past were somehow by definition superior. Rather, I’m alerting us to some ways ahistoric attitudes are affecting the church so we can be aware of what’s going on and better equipped to engage with those issues.

Attitudes of Ahistoricism

Ahistoricism is by no means everywhere in the church. But where ahistoricism is present, it manifests itself in three broad attitudes towards the past: irrelevance, ignorance, and ideology.

First, irrelevance posits that the way we did things in the past is simply not relevant to us anymore. We don’t think of history or our traditions as a guide or helpful resource for us.

Second, people are increasingly ignorant of history in general, as well as of Christianity’s history, teachings, and practices. Do we know the role Christianity has played in the founding ideas of our societies? Do we know how our core doctrinal beliefs and traditions developed, and are we aware of what they could offer us?

And, finally, ideology is when we approach the past with an ideological attitude and framework, which we then use to judge the past.

These three attitudes often overlap and influence one another and have multiple outworkings we can observe, but I’d like to focus on one in particular: a doctrinal drift from orthodoxy.

Ahistoricism’s Effect on Doctrine

By this, I mean the attempt to redefine or dispense with historic teachings and doctrines of the faith.

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