Do terrors belong to the parts of repentance?
Do terrors belong to the parts of repentance?
§ 45. After setting those things in front, Bellarmine (in ch. 19) forms five propositions in which he includes his opinion about the true and essential parts of repentance as follows. The first of these is: “The terror struck in the mind by the Law is not rightly placed among the parts of repentance.” Indeed, he concedes that as many terrors as possible are required for conversion, yet he denies expressly that they are a part of repentance.
We respond. Earlier [§ 41] we demonstrated that contrition or, what is the same, terrors produced by the Law are a part of repentance in the proper sense of the word, and even experience teaches this. For if terror produced by the Law is not part of repentance, what is the use of sermons on the Law in a person’s conversion?
** The following also claim that contrition is not part of repentance. Calvin (Instit., bk. 3, ch. 3, § 7) says, “Conversion begins from the horror and hatred of sin, and thus it is stated by the apostle that sorrow according to God [2 Cor. 7:10] is the cause of repentance.” Beza (Absters. calumniarum Heshusii, vol. 1, p. 328). Bucanus (locus 30, p. 291), where he says, “The antecedent, interior, immediate, and following cause of repentance is the fear of God from thinking on the judgment of God that is coming and before which we must stand.” But Sibrandus says (Declarat., p. 50): “Our repentance is not the antecedent but the consequence of justification; thus we are righteous before repenting.” Beza uses this argument: “If contrition of the heart or terrors of conscience were properly a part of repentance, it would be salvation-producing by its own nature.” We respond. First, this is a refutation of the consequent [elenchus consequentis],6 for contrition does not have to be salutary immediately and by its own nature since it is established as a part; thus we add faith, so that the sinner emerges out of the whirlpool of despair, and contrition becomes sorrow that is according to God (2 Cor. 7:10). **