Theopedia

Louis Berkhof

Theology is the systematized knowledge of God, of whom, through whom, and unto whom, are all things.1

Overview

Louis Berkhof (1873-1957) was a Reformed theologian who taught dogmatics at Calvin Theological Seminary, the seminary of the Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and later served as the seminary’s first president.2 Herman Bavinck’s Reformed theology “was made popular in the United States through the influence of” Berkhof, whose Systematic Theology became a standard textbook in American and Canadian seminaries and Bible colleges.2 Released in stages from 1932 and known under that title from 1941, it was also adopted at seminaries including Louisville, Columbia, and Princeton.3

Life and Ministry

Berkhof graduated from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1915.3 From 1926 he taught dogmatics at Calvin Theological Seminary, across a teaching career there that ran thirty-eight years and included service as the seminary’s first president.32 He acknowledged his own theological debt to Bavinck as well as to his former Princeton teachers, B. B. Warfield and Geerhardus Vos.4 Writing in the preface to a later printing of Systematic Theology, Berkhof reflected on the book’s reception after “more than fifteen years” in print: “I have every reason to be grateful for its kind reception, for the favourable testimony of many reviewers, and for the fact that the book is now used as a textbook in many Theological Seminaries and Bible Schools in our country, and that requests were even received from abroad for permission to translate it into other languages.”5

Theological Contribution

Theology as the study of God

Berkhof organized Systematic Theology in the traditional order, opening with the doctrine of God, and defended that arrangement on the ground that “theology is the systematized knowledge of God, of whom, through whom, and unto whom, are all things.”1 He set that starting point against the influence of Friedrich Schleiermacher, who had substituted “the religious consciousness of man” for the Word of God as theology’s source: on that approach, Berkhof wrote, “God came in at the end of a syllogism, or as the last link in a chain of reasoning, or as the cap-stone of a structure of human thought.”6 He held instead to two presuppositions at the outset of dogmatics, “that God exists” and “that He has revealed Himself in His divine Word.”1

Synthesizing Dutch and Princeton Reformed theology

Berkhof’s Systematic Theology combined two Reformed traditions in a single volume: Bavinck’s Dutch neo-Calvinist dogmatics and the Old Princeton theology of Warfield and Vos, under whom Berkhof had studied.4

Historical Significance

Jared Moore credits Berkhof with making Bavinck’s Reformed theology “popular in the United States” through a Systematic Theology that became, in Moore’s words, “a popular textbook for Bible college and seminary students across the United States and Canada.”2 Kenneth Stewart places Berkhof’s career among the evidence for his broader argument that Princeton-trained Reformed theologians, far from disappearing after Princeton Seminary’s 1929 reorganization, “were themselves propagating their understanding of the Reformed faith far and wide” across twentieth-century American institutions.3

Related Doctrines

References

  1. Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1969), 5. ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  2. Jared Heath Moore, A Biblical and Historical Appraisal of Concupiscence with Special Attention to Same-Sex Attraction (PhD diss., The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2019), 128-29: “Bavinck’s development of Reformed theology was made popular in the United States through the influence of Louis Berkhof (1873-1957). Berkhof was a Professor at Calvin Theological Seminary for 38 years and was its first President. His most influential work was his Systematic Theology that became a popular textbook for Bible college and seminary students across the United States and Canada.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  3. Kenneth J. Stewart, “Hardier than Supposed: The Resurgence of Calvinism Across the 20th Century,” Themelios 50, no. 2 (2025): 289: “Since 1926, the 1915 graduate of Princeton Seminary, Louis Berkhof, had been professor of dogmatics in the seminary of the Christian Reformed Church, Calvin Seminary, Grand Rapids. Beginning in 1932 he released, in three parts, what would eventually be known from 1941 as his Systematic Theology. This textbook was used in Louisville, Columbia, and Princeton seminaries (among other institutions) from the time of its release.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  4. Stewart, “Hardier than Supposed,” 289: “Berkhof gladly acknowledged his indebtedness to Herman Bavinck… as well as his former Princeton mentors, B. B. Warfield and Geerhardus Vos.” (Ellipsis marks a parenthetical birth/death date for Bavinck that this library’s transcription of the Themelios text gives incorrectly, as “1873-1921” rather than 1854-1921; see articles/herman-bavinck.md.) ↩ ↩2

  5. Louis Berkhof, preface to Systematic Theology (London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1969), 2. ↩

  6. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 5-6. ↩