By Sean Michael Lucas
Presbyterian & Reformed Publishing.
Back in my graduate school days, I wrote a research paper entitled “Robert Lewis Dabney, The Cassandra of Yankeedom,” hoping to tweak the nose of my socialist, feminist, anti-southern professor. I was disappointed she hadn’t heard of R.L. Dabney before, but delighted at the twisted proboscus that resulted from her exposure to him. It is gratifying to record that a hundred years after his best writing, the learned Virginia theologian and philosopher could still challenge, if not appall, humanist intellectual elites.
Unfortunately, Dr. Dabney might even anger modern evangelicals if they consider his arguments against government education, feminism, evolutionary theory, and industrial capitalism, not to mention his bold teaching of Calvinism, love of the patriarchal old South, and defense of the Confederacy.
“As a preacher, as a teacher, as a writer, he achieved greatness” wrote the renowned Princeton theologian B.B. Warfield of Dr. Dabney. A.A. Hodge of Princeton called him “the best teacher of theology in the United States, if not the world.” Yet, Dr. Dabney rejected the pleas to join the faculty of Princeton and remained a professor for thirty years at the small Presbyterian seminary located at Hampden-Sydney in Virginia. Robert Lewis Dabney, however, was no ivory tower intellectual or academic drudge, for he acted on his convictions, never avoiding the “sharp end” of battle with his enemies. In fact, the War Between the States (1861-1865) defined for him where honor, patriotism, and Christian duty would lead the rest of his life.
After Dabney’s death at the end of the nineteenth century, his successor and friend Thomas Cary Johnson compiled a life of his mentor based on the voluminous correspondence preserved in the family archives. The Life and Letters of Robert Lewis Dabney joined the Collected Writings, The Life and Letters of Stonewall Jackson, and several other historical and theological books written by Dr. Dabney himself to round out the unique oeuvre of the contentious Southern Presbyterian.
Because he left behind such a rich trove of writing, Dabney has been the subject of several excellent Ph.D. dissertations and examination by historians of the antebellum south like Eugene Genovese, E. Brooks Holifield, and Bertram Wyatt-Brown. Nevertheless, the old south theologian and controversialist remains virtually unknown outside of such specialized academic circles. Sean Michael Lucas will, in part, rectify the neglect of the Union Seminary professor in Robert Lewis Dabney: A Southern Presbyterian Life, the first biography of Dabney in more than one hundred years.
The key to understanding Professor Lucas’s approach is found in the subtitle of the book — A Southern Presbyterian Life. He views Dabney as both a representative Southern Presbyterian minister and scholar as well as an irredentist ex-Confederate who never stopped fighting a war with the modern world. The Yankees never left his sights and the advocates of the post-war new South felt the bitter sting of his arrows in defense of the old landmarks.
The author narrates the basic facts of Dabney’s life — birth, marriage, education, first pastorate, service in the war, and post-war academic career. This book, however, may be a disappointment for the reader seeking the detailed minutiae of R.L. Dabney’s life that a larger book would entail. For instance, he provides very little detail of his service as Stonewall Jackson’s adjutant and the role he played in the Valley Campaign. For someone seeking specifics of his military record, they should consult Stonewall Jackson by J.I. Robertson. Also, not much is written concerning Dabney’s wife and children and his relationships with them. Thomas Cary Johnson’s work reveals more of his domestic life.
The heart and soul of this biography is analysis of R.L. Dabney’s theological and philosophical ideas and the profound influence of the southern culture of honor, social distinctions, and patriarchy. Professor Lucas especially rises to the challenge of explaining Dabney’s arguments against the “sensualistic philosophy” of the world and the influence of “Scottish Common Sense Realism” on his thinking. The author places Dabney squarely in the southern political tradition: “a religiously grounded society sanctified by social distinctions, exalted local agriculturally based societies, and limited representative republican government.” As a Presbyterian, the old south theologian virtually defined the “Old School” beliefs: strict adherence to the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Calvinism of Frances Turretin.
Dr. Lucas brings to bear the arguments of several recent historical works defining the southern code of honor. He applies the psychological principles contained in those books to the Virginia theologian. I believe the author misunderstands Dr. Dabney at this point. Based upon Dabney’s commemorative discourse on Stonewall Jackson entitled “True Courage” (Discussions, Vol. 4), Dr. Lucas suggests that Dabney created a new definition of honor and manhood, “which culminated in Dabney’s Life of Jackson” which was “Dabney’s attempt to rationalize his [own] avoidance of the war and to reclaim his manly honor.” Dr. Dabney’s actions prove otherwise. He rushed off to the seat of war with his students and was at the Battle of 1st Manassas as a chaplain. A few months later, General Jackson himself called upon Dabney to join him in the Valley as his adjutant. The forty-two year old seminary professor humbly submitted that he knew nothing of the art of war but agreed to come after Jackson’s repeated and determined request.
Stonewall Jackson recruited his staff with the utmost care. He pursued men possessing skills and potential they perhaps did not see in themselves. He selected men whose civilian employments provided experience which could be honed by the general to his purposes. Above all, he chose men of character and valor. Dr. Dabney was such a man.
He was thrown into the whirlwind of active campaign almost immediately and had to learn his craft as on-the-job training. His reports were probably too long and his military bearing left something to be desired, but General Jackson was satisfied with the work. Dabney came under fire several times in the front lines. He tried to complete all that the General required of him. He did not “redefine honor” or courage to cover himself; he defined it in biblical terms within a culture which understood exactly what he meant.
Professor Lucas further speculates about the bitterness Dabney displayed over Confederate defeat, attributing it to feelings of personal dishonor for not taking part in the front lines! Major Dabney exhausted himself in the Valley Campaign and the Seven Days but was compelled to resign his commission due to severe “camp fever” (a form of dysentery). Continued physical suffering, and a belief that he could best serve the cause through its intellectual defense, Dabney remained at the seminary for the duration of the war, unbending in defiance to the invaders and encouraging other Christians to stay the course. He may never have gotten over the war but he evinced no sense of personal dishonor over his role.
Professor Lucas strongly criticizes Dabney for his uncompromising resistance to rejoining the Northern Presbyterians (he was “narrow and implacable” and “his battle against the Northern Church did more to damage his reputation than any other action”) and his defense of segregation (“a completely indefensible moment in his career”). Dabney’s positions on race and reconciliation carried the day in debates at the synods for many years but are considered by the author, major reasons for his unpopularity then and disregard today.
The biography contains a surprising chapter comparing the Virginian Robert Lewis Dabney to the great Dutch prime minister Abraham Kuyper. Though dissimilar in many ways, both men boldly addressed the intellectual, political, and cultural issues of their day from a biblical worldview. For Dabney, the enemies included public education, feminism, evolutionary theory, and any other “anti-biblical theory of rights” which denied God’s sovereignty, providence, or moral law. “Against the rationalism evident in modern science as informed by positivist science, Dabney urged the truth of the biblical revelation.”
I am reminded of the Southern writer John Crowe Ransome who wrote in an essay for Harper’s Magazine in 1929 what Robert Lewis Dabney understood in his day:
It is out of fashion these days to look backward rather than forward; and about the only American given commonly to this disgraceful conduct is some unreconstructed Southerner, who persists in his regard for a certain terrain, a certain history, and a certain inherited way of living. He sees himself in the American scene as an anachronism, and knows he is felt by his neighbors as a reproach.... I wish that he were not so entirely taken for granted, and that as a reproach he might bear a barb and inflict a sting.
Dr. Dabney did throw many a barb and the progressives felt his sting, at least among Presbyterians. Though it is still out of fashion to consider the fathers and weigh their arguments and respect their wisdom, it is no less right and necessary that we do so.
It is a happy providence that Robert Lewis Dabney was chosen for the inaugural volume in the American Reformed Biography series. As a complex man of great intellect, passion, and conviction, he tried to apply the Scriptures to every area of life and persuade the church to follow. He was far from perfect, as he readily admitted, but we would do well to learn from him and heed the admonition on his tombstone: “Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.”
Reviewed by William Potter
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