Chapter 8
Predestination
278. Does the word predestination include reprobation as well as election?
In the sacred Scriptures the word is more frequently used in application to election only,
but most divines now extend it to embrace both because the word προοριζειν is often
used in reference to wicked actions and because reprobation is expressed by Zanchius1 as
perfectly synonymous with predestination.
279. Were angels predestinated as well as men?
Yes: Paul says to Timothy, "I charge you before God and the elect angels" (1 Tim. 5:21).
If some were elected or chosen, it implies that others were left or reprobated, who are
said to be reserved in chains and darkness to the great judgment.
280. Is man as fallen the object of predestination?
This is generally the opinion2 among orthodox divines in opposition to those who
suppose that man, as creatable, was the object of God's predestinating decrees,3 because
1. That which does not exist cannot be the object of a positive decree.
2. If man, as creatable, was the object of predestination, then either all creatable
men or only a part of them must have been predestinated; but it is evident that
1 [Girolamo Zanchi (1516–1590) was an influential Italian, Reformed theologian, and professor.] 2 [Also known as infralapsarianism. Alexander below calls it sublapsarianism.] 3 [Known as supralapsarianism.]
all were not, and if but a part were, they must have been foreseen as certainly
future, and so on.
3. If a man as creatable and fallible4 was the object of predestination, then the
creation and fall are means of predestination, which they cannot be, otherwise
God would have entered into a decree to save or destroy man before He had
determined His creation or its fall.
4. This doctrine makes God to reprobate men before that through sin they were
liable to reprobation.
It may moreover be further argued in favor of man as fallen being the object of
predestination
1. Because the saints are said to be chosen out of the world (John 15:19).
2. From Paul's figure of the mass from which the vessels of honor and dishonor
were made (Rom. 9:21). This mass represented the object of predestination,
which, with it, must have been corrupt.
3. Because the illustration of the mercy and justice of God in election and
reprobation supposes the object of these decrees to be already miserable or
sinful.
281. Does not a wise agent always determine the end before the means?
This principle is the ground of the famous axiom of Twisse,5 "That which is last in
execution was first in design," which Turretin says holds with regard to the ultimate end,
but not to all others (which would prove that what is next to last in execution must have
4 [Able to err.] 5 [William Twisse (1578–1646) was a prominent English supralapsarian and moderator of the Westminster Assembly.]
been next to last in design, etc.). It also holds where there is an essential subordination of
things, but there is no such subordination between creation, fall, and redemption.
282. What is the supralapsarian doctrine in regard to the order of decrees?
They make the decrees of election and reprobation to precede the decrees to create and to
permit man to fall.
283. What is the sublapsarian doctrine, and wherein does it differ from the other?
The sublapsarian doctrine is that the creation and permission of the fall of man were
decreed before his election or reprobation. The first of these [views, supralapsarianism,]
makes man as creatable and fallible (or to be created and to fall), as the object of the
decree of predestination; the second [makes] man as created and fallen [to be the object
of predestination].
284. Is there at bottom any difference between these two systems?
None. The purposes of God in reference to men may be viewed in the following order:6
6 [This "solution" is very similar to that of Peter van Mastricht (1630–1706). Heinrich Heppe summarizes and quotes Mastricht in Reformed Dogmatics (Wipf & Stock, 2007), ch. 8, "Predestination," p. 162:
Mastricht e.g. attempts to mediate the opposition between the supraand infralapsarian ways of looking at it by distinguishing a fourfold actus praedestinationis [acts of predestination] (III, ii, 12): "Four acts of God are here to be observed:
(1) the purpose to manifest the glory of mercy and of punishing righteousness; (2) the statute to create all men and permit them to lapse in a common beginning. (3) of those created and fallen to choose one in whom He would acquire the glory of mercy, and to
reprobate another in whom He would obtain the glory of avenging righteousness. (4) an intention to prepare and direct the means corresponding to election and to reprobation. By reason of the first act of predestination the object could only have been homo creabilis et labilis [man creatable and mutable], since no decree so far is presupposed to have been made concerning creation and the fall: by reason of the second act it is strictly homo creandus et lapsurus [man to be created
1) His decree to manifest the glory of His perfections in His dealings with man
2) His decree of creating and permitting them to fall
3) His fore-appointment of some men to be subjects of mercy and others of wrath
4) His fixing the means necessary for both of these objects
285. Did not God determine all things by one most simple act?
Yes, the decrees of God may be considered as one most perfect purpose, which destroys
all debate relative to their order.
and to fall]; by reason of the third homo creatus et lapsus [man as created and fallen]; by reason of the fourth homo electus et reprobus [man as elect and reprobate].
Since therefore, so far as it is distinguished from election and reprobation, predestination consists of two prime acts, you would be most accurate in saying that the object of predestination is homo creabilis et labilis, creandus at lapsurus; while at the same time the object of election and reprobation is homo creatus et lapsus. Thus most conveniently you will have reconciled specifically dissident views and most safely removed difficulties with which each side wants to saddle the side opposed to it."]