Groen van Prinsterer and the Failure of the French Revolution

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Groen van Prinsterer – henceforth GvP - (1801-1876) in his book “Vrijheid, Gelijkheid, Broederschap” (1848), which has now been translated into English by Jan Adriaan Schlebusch under the title of “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity - A Refutation of Liberalism” [RefCon Press, 2022] and thus benefiting a wider readership, is nothing short of a frontal and often a scathing attack on the anthropocentric and thus anti-theistic mindset of the French Revolution with its deep taproots in the Enlightenment concept of the autonomy of human reason. The book is littered with historical allusions to countries and events too numerous to mention that point to the “the destructive nature of the Revolutionary ideas” [p. 104], invariably climaxing in political “despotism”[p. 123]. “Has the new doctrine lived up to its promises” [p. 77]? The answer always is a resounding ‘No’! The three slogans mentioned in the title of the book are carefully analysed one by one and utterly repudiated, each in turn, for being completely unbiblical in their reinterpretation along the lines of the contemporary utopian mindset that is entirely detached from real life – but still alive! Says GvP, “Liberty, equality, and fraternity…I would argue that, by their nature, these doctrines make improvements impossible. They don’t mitigate abuses but worsen them. And the very cause of the gravest abuses is inherent to them”[p. 73]. GvP maintains that “it is evident to all that these doctrines are utterly destructive to all peace and safety” [p. 70]. Nevertheless, the author tells us that he is “not an unconditional supporter of preserving the past”[ p.33] and goes on to say that “I do not oppose the remediation of the system, but I am convinced that the radical remedies proposed to us today are equivalent to death itself” [p. 108]. GvP argues for the possibility of creating a better world, without losing sight of the world to come. Where atheism has always failed - “every promise not only ends in disappointment but ends up delivering the opposite of that which was promised in the political program” [p. 86] -, Christians have often succeeded, such as William Wilberforce, Elizabeth Fry and Thomas Chalmers, in their respective spheres. In the words of another Dutch author, H. Bavinck, GvP insists that “the common foundation of all rights and duties lies in the sovereignty of God” [Reformed Ethics, in loc.]. A. Kuyper, under the influence of GvP, argues more rigorously for the kingship of Jesus Christ over every sphere of human existence! In contrast to and irreconcilably antithetical to French revolutionary thinking, it is “from the Bible, the Christian learns his duties, calculates his prospects, and appreciates his privileges”[p. 135]. One detects stronger echoes of GvP’s thinking notably in Abraham Kuyper’s more fully developed Calvinistic perspective on the creation ordinances and the historical outworking in human history as seen in the Kuyper’s emphasis on the sovereignty of God over every sphere of human existence, including the ‘public square’, to use an anachronistic term. GvP’s Calvinism is not confined to the ecclesiastical sphere, and the reader is encouraged to study culture theologically rather than anthropologically. Overall, GvP’s chief axiom (which, of course, is not original but Augustinian in essence) can best be summed up in his own words: “All of history, politics, and society is the battleground between faith and unbelief - a battle in which the Christian is called to engage with a confidence in the inevitability of Christ’s victory over the seed of the serpent” [p .123]. The 20 th century in particular, of course, bears greater and more eloquent testimony to GvP’s farsightedness to the failure of socialism! The post-modern mindset needs to hear GvP afresh – but only for starters, whetting one’s appetite for more! Much more needs to be said than has been said and can be said and must be said as we are witnessing the rapid decline of Western civilisation. GvP’s book offers a challenging and vigorous alternative to an effeminate culture of small-minded, pessimistic Nothingarians that is hell-bent on seeking yet again ‘to edge God out of His universe onto a Cross’ (D. Bonhoeffer)! There are certainly better works one could recommend on critiquing the French Revolution in more detail, but if God is not God of all and over all, then He is not God at all. This lies at the heart of GVP’s book. From that angle, there is no better and easily accessible introduction known to the reviewer.