Theories of Development in the Oxford Movement is a revision of James Pereiro’s earlier work, Ethos and the Oxford Movement (2008), which seeks to examine the origins of the theory of doctrinal development within the Oxford Movement. In doing so, he focuses closely on John Henry Newman’s intellectual journey towards a full acceptance of this concept. While Pereiro accepts that the seeds of the principle can be found in Newman's Arians of the Fourth Century (1833), his study shows that, for most of the 1830s, Newman believed that the test of orthodox belief was to be found in an appeal to the teaching of the primitive church and that doctrines of faith were static concepts which did not change over the course of time.

In tracing the history of Newman’s understanding of the theory of development, this study attempts to correct the argument, made by Owen Chadwick and others, that his 1845 Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine marked a sudden shift in his position and came about as a reaction to the opposition which the movement was facing. In Pereiro’s view, Newman’s acceptance of development was the result of a long and complex process of thought and was influenced by a number of principles which had been central to Tractarian thinking since the beginning of the movement. While it is difficult to determine exactly when Newman came to accept the theory of doctrinal development, Pereiro draws upon evidence from his correspondence to suggest that the principles reflected in his 1845 Essay already formed part of his thinking in 1840.

Pereiro’s study begins by focusing on three concepts which were fundamental to the Tractarian theory of religious knowledge. The concept of ethos referred to a particular attitude of mind and spiritual temper which, according to the Tractarians, made an individual more or less receptive to God’s will. In their view, an ethos marked by humility was likely to produce a positive moral attitude which would be open to orthodox teaching. Realization, which was closely linked to ethos, was understood as the process by which truths which had already been assented to came to have a more complete influence over the mind, heart and actions. Ethos and realization were both related to the principle of reserve, the belief, reflected in Newman’s Arians of the Fourth Century and in Tracts 80 and 87 by Isaac Williams, that the revelation of divine truth in scripture and the life of the church was always made in accordance with humanity’s ability to receive that teaching.

According to Pereiro, each of these concepts helped to lead Newman towards a full acceptance of development. The principle of reserve, which the Tractarians saw as lying behind the catechetical practice of the early church, whereby doctrines were not revealed openly to all but taught gradually and in accordance with the individual’s ability to receive that teaching, had helped to explain why later beliefs were not found in the patristic writings. Although the early church had accepted such teachings, its adherence to the principle of reserve meant that they had not been formally expressed until a later stage. This led Newman to draw a distinction between explicit and implicit faith and to claim that doctrines which were formally defined by the church must already have been held implicitly at an earlier stage. He also saw the concept of development as a process of realisation whereby the church reflected on beliefs which were held implicitly and subjected them to ‘verbal expression, theological treatment, dogmatic definition and the like’ (p. 131).

Although Newman did not refer to ‘ethos’ directly in his Essay on Development, Pereiro claims that the concept lay behind his frequent references to ‘temper’, ‘moral temper’ and ‘first principles’. At the heart of the theory of development was the belief that a fully developed doctrine would always be in line with its original principles, a belief which Pereiro sees as a conceptual and historical ‘development’ of ethos in itself. Moreover, the fact that Newman introduced the word ‘ethos’ into his 1845 editions of the Essay on Development can be seen as evidence that the genesis of this theory lay in the Tractarian approach to religious knowledge.

This study also successfully demonstrates that the theory of doctrinal development existed within the Oxford Movement before Newman came to accept the concept. The first advocate of the theory was not one of the movement’s main leaders but Samuel Francis Wood (1809-43), one of Newman’s students at Oriel, whose contribution to the Oxford Movement has hitherto gone unrecognised by Tractarian scholars. Pereiro’s close examination of Wood’s correspondence with Newman and Manning in 1835 shows how the younger man had come to believe that God had intended development of doctrine to be a fundamental aspect of the church’s history. At this time, Manning and Newman rejected Wood’s arguments, claiming that the idea of development tended towards rationalism and showed disrespect for the writings of the church fathers. Wood’s letters, however, suggest that it is essential to look beyond the writings of the movement’s main leaders in order to fully understand the origins of the principle. Pereiro also makes reference to a manuscript that Wood wrote for Freidrich Tholuck, a friend of E.B. Pusey, which contains the earliest extant narrative of the Oxford Movement. Both this letter and Wood’s correspondence with Manning and Newman are reproduced in appendices to his study.

Theories of Development in the Oxford Movement provides a fascinating appraisal of the role of doctrinal development within the Oxford Movement which, by a thorough and insightful analysis of the Tractarians’ writings and correspondence, reiterates and confirms the thesis put forward in Pereiro’s earlier work. Far from being a concept which marked a discontinuity between Newman’s thinking immediately before his conversion and his earlier views, this study makes a convincing argument that development was inextricably linked to principles which had always formed an important aspect of the Oxford Movement. In examining the Tractarian theory of religious knowledge Pereiro has also shown that, far from being a merely devotional phenomenon, the Oxford Movement was deeply concerned with the relationship between the intellectual and ethical aspects of faith. By helping to place the concept of doctrinal development in its proper context, Pereiro’s latest study makes an invaluable contribution to Tractarian scholarship.