Oh BBAS, he is NOT(!) well regarded by Reformed thinkers... the link that I gave to you above is to Reformed author and Professor Mike Horton's stern critique of Finney..... here is a section from it... but cut and paste the link into your browser, it will take you to the full article and it is well worth the time to read it.... anyway:
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[font=geneva,arial,sans-serif]In an April, 1876, article in Bibliotheca Sacra, G. F. Wright criticized Charles Hodge's review of Finney's Systematic Theology for representing Finney as "putting the universe in the place of God," but Warfield agreed with Hodge that this is the logical conclusion of his theology.23 But was this rather severe indictment justified in the light of the evidence?[/font]
[font=geneva,arial,sans-serif]In the Lectures, Finney demonstrates an unwitting dependence upon the Newtonian metaphysics that conceived of the universe rather mechanically. Frequently, the author will refer to a universal "intelligence," "reason," "law," "government," or "principle," that is supreme and to which even God is subject. As far as the divine attributes are concerned, "All God's moral attributes are only so many attributes of love or of disinterested benevolence,"24 and such comments are pronounced without the slightest exegetical appeal, much unlike the Confession itself. In fact, one is impressed throughout the Lectures with the absence of proof texts, the collection reading like a volume of Blackstone's Law.[/font]
[font=geneva,arial,sans-serif]Nothing like a traditional method of systematic theology is attempted and the doctrine of God is strangely deduced from "self-evident principles" rather than from Scripture. The result is a deity whose features are virtually indistinguishable from Islam's "Allah." There is nothing specifically Christian about Finney's doctrine of God, much less is it an explicitly evangelical description.[/font]
[font=geneva,arial,sans-serif]Finney's anthropology suffers from a similar lack of exegesis and historical-theological reflection. Once again the theory is proved that those who naively and self-confidently presume to be independent of the sources (i.e., "mere men") are often the most easily beguiled by the subtleties of what they do not understand. Finney's anti-intellectualism and self-confidence notwithstanding, he was a mirror reflection of his age. Taylor, in The Quarterly Christian Spectator, June 1829, argued that children are not born into the world sinful, but rapidly acquire a self-indulgent disposition by practice and repetition until it becomes a bias. Assuming a Kantian categorical imperative, Finney follows the Taylorites to the conclusion that if God commands something, it must be possible. Edwards, of course, argued that this was acceptable if by "possible" one meant "naturally possible." There is nothing inherent in nature essentially that predisposes one to sin. Sin cannot be attributed to a defective faculty. Rather, human beings are "morally incapable" of doing that which lies within their natural ability. With that distinction denied, the New Haven Divinity embraced Kant's "ought implies can" and Finney took that to mean that if God commands absolute perfection, it must be attainable by human beings according to their present condition. Hodge responded to this aspect of Finney's work in the following manner: "It is merely a dictum of philosophers, not of common people that 'I ought, therefore I can.' Every unsophisticated heart and especially every heart burdened with a sense of sin says rather, 'I ought to be able, but I am not.""[/font]
