Is there one Christian Intellectual Tradition

In his ongoing reflections on the beginning of a christian law school, Bruce Green writes this morning about how a distinctively christian law school is shaped by the Christian Intellectual Tradition. He states:

While I cannot recall its origin, I have come to believe that, perhaps, the most fruitful way of thinking about the Christian intellectual tradition is in terms of two aspects: (1) the coherent legacy of orthodox Christian belief applied to various disciplines traced across the centuries through the thought and work of key individuals; and (2) the way of thinking and engaging in the intellectual life that is the outcome of centuries of experience and critical reflection. The legacy of orthodox Christian belief begins with the Holy Scriptures as the authoritative foundation. Through the consensual memory of the church, reflected in the formulations of the great church councils of antiquity, and in the broader sense the whole body of patristic writings, in the course of time, arrives at certain interpretations and classic (i.e., conforming to the best authority) formulations. This does not prevent later developments in doctrine but form a touchstone against which later developments are to be seen and judged. The writings of medieval and modern theologians and thinkers become classic by virtue of their consistency with the Holy Scriptures as affirmed by the historic Christian community. In other words, a view is considered within the Christian intellectual tradition if it conforms to the teaching of the Holy Scriptures as those Scriptures have been consistently understood by key Christian thinkers through the ages. There is no room for untethered private judgment in the Christian intellectual tradition. One may entertain private viewpoints at will, but they are more or less persuasive by virtue of their rootedness in the historic understanding of the Bible. Thus, it is, and will be, our position that the duty of those in a distinctively Christian law school is to show how true knowledge flows from the Creator through the specific body of knowledge known as law. In so doing, we will seek to illustrate the soundness of our approach by its coherent legacy that starts with the Holy Scriptures and is traced across the centuries in the thought of orthodox thinkers. A Christian educational institution does not create its own authority; it receives a tradition and perpetuates it in the various disciplines it undertakes to teach.

I find two challenges here. 1. The legacy of orthodox belive, in a consensual fashion ends with the councils of the church, and while we must recover the Orthodox interest in the patristic writers and reflect on thier word for our day, we cannot ignore the influence of 1500 years of intellectual tumult often carried on in the name of christian tradition - and rarely emerging with consensus. When I see policy judgements emerging from a law school, I imagine they will be informed by more recent thought, and I worry if there is no confession of the incorporation of those traditions into policy. 2. No room for untethered private judjement? While judgement is informed by a rootedness, there is always judgement going on. We cannot get away from the subjectivity of interpreting the tradition - indeed reshaping the tradion we are in. I agree that we should always be looking to the authority of our scriptures and the traditions that inform our christian history when we approach trades like law, or parenting or evanglism - but the plural versions of the faith that have emerged, like a river that has carried much rock and now is settling down in those briaded channels, must be recognized. I'm showing a pluralistic, polychromatic vision of faith and belief in this suspicion of agressive worldview thinking. Informed by an understanding of God who includes Jim Wallis and Jerry Falwell among his faithful, A God who loves the anabaptist pacifist antiglobalization protesters as well as the conservative god and country warbloggers. I'm informed by Baktihn, by Dostoyevsky, by Roger Lundin and by my private untethered judgement. Am I wrong? maybe....