Forde and Erlangen have a different law than Luther, Melanchthon, Chemnitz, Gerhard, Hollaz, and the rest of Lutheran Orthodoxy. The Erlangen School drove a wedge between Luther and Lutheran Orthodoxy in order to support JCK von Hoffman’s rejection of the substitutionary atonement. Forde admits as much in his doctoral thesis, published as The Law-Gospel Debate: An Interpretation of Its Historical Development (1969).

Erlangen’s theological foundations are subjectivist, even Schleiermachian. Sasse admitted as much. In Forde’s view, God’s Word isn’t the Bible, it is the “event” of the sinner being condemned by the Law and being confronted with the Gospel. Sanctification does not include Christian growth, but is perpetually confined to the dying/rising again paradigm. Sanctification is justification in Forde’s view.

Unfortunately, Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, has for a long time promoted the work of Forde and the Erlangen School. For that, one needs to look at the work of Prof. John T. Pless, who has made every effort to “repristinate” not Lutheran Orthodoxy, but 19th and 20th century post-Kantian, European/American Lutheranism, quite foreign to the “original position” of The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod and the old Synodical Conference.

This is unsurprising, since Pless originated out of the American Lutheran Church, and was wooed into the LCMS by Norman Nagel, a vigorous promoter of Werner Elert at Valpo and Concordia Seminary, St. Louis.