Dualistic DetachmentThe failure to maintain the unity of the Father, Son and
Holy Spirit in the unity of their Being and action always
leads to aberrational understandings and expressions of
Christianity. The history of Christian religion (as distinct
from Christianity) is replete with man’s attempts to divide
the persons of the Godhead into distinct functions, and to
sever Christ’s work from His person. This latter disjunctive
dualism is the more subtle and the most prevalent
throughout what is called “Christian history.” Christianity
is conceived of as some “thing” established apart from, and
distinct from, Christ Himself. The gospel, the Church, the
kingdom are regarded as separate entities offered,
extended, established, effected or dispensed by Jesus
Christ, independent of Himself. T.F. Torrance correctly
identifies such “detachment of Christianity from Christ” 3 as
the result of epistemological dualism, noting that
“fundamentalism is unwilling to acknowledge the identity in being
between what God is toward us in His revelation in Jesus Christ
and what He is in His living Being and Reality in Himself.” 4Examples of such “separated concepts” of
fundamentalist dualism should be instructive, if not
convicting: