Geerhardus vos biography definition

Dutch-American Calvinist theologian

Geerhardus Johannes Vos (March 14, 1862 – August 13, 1949) was a Dutch-American Calvinisttheologian and one of the most distinguished representatives of the Princeton Theology. He is sometimes called the father of ReformedBiblical theology.

Biography

Vos was born to a Dutch Reformedpastor in Heerenveen in Friesland in the Netherlands. In 1881, when Geerhardus was 19 years old, his father, Jan Vos, accepted a call to be the pastor of a Christian Reformed Church congregation in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Education in Europe and America

In September, 1881, Geerhardus Vos began his higher education at the Christian Reformed Church's Theological School, which is today's Calvin University and Calvin Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, and his exceptional talents were soon recognized by the school, for he earned his bachelor's degree in a single year. During this period, Vos was appointed by the Curatorium to be the instructional assistant of Gerrit Egbert Boer, the teacher of the school as well as the president of the assembly. D

Geerhardus Vos:

Life Between Two Worlds

James T. Dennison, Jr.

There were not many present that Wednesday afternoon; not many present at all. No one was there from his denomination; no one was there from the institution he had served for nearly thirty-nine years. Only one person from his family appears to have been there. A man and a woman from the local Methodist Church were there. They sang a hymn. Ironically, the institution to which he had declined to transfer at its formation in 1929 was there—in the person of her most noted Dutchman; no antithesis here—Dutchman paying tribute to Dutchman. Cornelius Van Til was there with his Dutch friend, Rev. John De Waard; John De Waard, pastor of Memorial Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Rochester, New York. Van Til of Westminster Seminary and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church; De Waard, graduate of Princeton Seminary and member of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Two Dutchmen were there to bury their countryman, conducting his casket from the village Methodist Church to a simple hillside cemetery. Van Til, De Waard and the casket of Geerhardus Vos in the tiny village of Roaring Branch, Pennsylvania on Wednesday, August 17, 1949. And there in that grassy cemetery, they laid his remains next to those of his wife, Catherine; Catherine Vos who had died September 14, 1937. Geerhardus interred in the mountain village not far from the summer house where Catherine and he and their four children passed so many pleasant hours between May and September. Pleasant morning hours of study followed by the mile-long walk to the post office in town. Afternoon reading on the porch with the children followed by another walk to the post office. And evenings in the study once more, surrounded by his books and journals and papers. And on Sunday? the walk to the Methodist Church for worship—the only church in the village. The ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A. worships in a Methodist Church; the Professor

Who is Geerhardus Vos and what drew you to him?

Geerhardus Vos (1862-1949) is rightly considered the “Father of Reformed Biblical Theology.”  Princeton Theological Seminary established a chair in biblical theology in 1893 and sought Vos to fill it.  He accepted the invitation and would serve for thirty-nine years until his retirement in 1932. 

In speaking for myself, Vos is unparelled as an exegete and theologian. This is not to take away from the great insights of so many other gifted individuals, but his commitment to the Scriptures and understanding of Christ at the heart of redemptive history was life-changing. There is no hedging with Vos, just as there is no hedging in the Bible. Your life is either found in Christ or it is not.

Perhaps the greatest contribution from Vos is when he unpacks for us the original purpose of creation. What then was the end goal for humans (Adam and Eve) and what would have happened if they had never ate that forbidden fruit?

In exegeting Genesis 1–3 and 1 Corinthians 15:42-50, Vos believed that the Reformed faith had not errored in proclaiming that the Bible taught that God created Adam and Eve upright in righteousness and holiness.  He also believed that the Reformed faith was correct in arguing that perpetual life in this original estate of innocence was not the goal set before Adam and Eve. In Genesis 2:16–17, God extended to Adam and Eve the prospect of life with God in an estate of Glory. In Vos’s words, “Man had been created perfectly good in a moral sense. And yet there was a sense in which he could be raised to a still higher level of perfection” (Biblical Theology, 22).  The prospect of leaving the probation state behind and entering into a higher estate was because of God’s condescension, not anything inherent in man’s creation.

Appealing to Revelation 2:7, Vos understood further that the tree of life was reserved for

Gelukkige Verjaardag
[Dutch for Happy Birthday!]

When the author of these historical vignettes was studying for his Doctorate of Ministry degree at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri, one of the assignments was to read the first seventy-five pages of Geerhardus Vos’s book on Biblical Theology.  This should be a snap, I thought.  Only seventy-five pages of a large treatise.  It was one of my most difficult assignments ever, as Dr. Vos used complex theological words which only a theological  dictionary, my constant companion, would define. So it was slow going all the way through. In frustration I called my father, who had studied under Dr. Vos at Princeton  Seminary in 1929, hoping to receive some comfort about this assigned book. I received none from my dad.  His response was that I didn’t have to sit under Dr. Vos and interpret his “thick Dutch accent” while taking notes, so be thankful for small blessings!

Born this day, March 14, 1862, in Heerenveen, The Netherlands, Geerhardus Vos grew to become one of the finest and yet one of the last examples of the old Princeton theology. Immigrating to the United States in 1881 when his father answered a call to serve as pastor of a church in Grand Rapids, young Vos prepared for the ministry first at the Christian Reformed Seminary in Grand Rapids and then at the Princeton Theological Seminary, before taking his doctoral studies in Berlin and Strassburg.  After about five years teaching at the Seminary in Grand Rapids, he was named as the first Professor of Biblical Theology at the Princeton Theological Seminary, taking that post in 1893 and serving there until retirement at the age of 70, in 1932.

When Princeton Seminary was reorganized and modernists put in positions of authority over the Seminary, Vos was within three years of retirement. He chose to remain rather than follow Robert Dick Wilson and J. Gresham Machen as they founded Westminster Theological