The Wesleyan Quadrilateral: An Introduction

Description

I think that the Wesleyan quadrilateral, which is a shorthand way that followers of John Wesley summarize his understanding of religious authority, continues to be crucial to how Christians today understand and live out the gospel of Jesus Christ. Wesley’s fourfold understanding of religious authority included Scripture, tradition, reason, and experience. He considered Scripture to be unique, inspired, trustworthy, and the primary religious authority for Christian beliefs, values, and practices. In addition, Wesley appealed to tradition, reason, and experience as genuine, albeit secondary, religious authorities that helped Christians contextualize their understanding and application of biblical Christianity. It was important for Wesley to investigate the full context of religious data as he inductively and deductively studied Scripture as well as church tradition and relevant experience—including experience that is spiritual and physical, individual and collective.

Not all Christians acknowledge consciously the contextual nature of their theological understanding and applications of Scripture. So this introduction to the Wesleyan quadrilateral is intended first to present Wesley’s understanding of religious authority and theological method. Second, it is hoped that Christians of all church traditions will bring their beliefs and values in line with their practices, who contextualize their Christianity without realizing that they are doing it.

In 1990, I published The Wesleyan Quadrilateral with Zondervan, and Emeth Press still publishes it. This introduction to the Wesleyan quadrilateral largely represents an abridgment of my earlier book, with revisions. As such, emphasis is placed upon a historical understanding of Wesley’s theology, rather than upon contemporary scholarship on the topic. Most of the revisions in this book have to do with the structuring, naming, and ordering of chapters, and the addition of discussion questions at the end of each chapter. If one wants to study more in-depth the Wesleyan quadrilateral, then one may read my earlier book: The Wesleyan Quadrilateral.