9. § 43. The Order of Salvation.
§ 43. The Order of Salvation.
. Our heart is created for God, and it does not rest until it finds rest in Him. Insofar as every human being, consciously or unconsciously, strives after an unchangeable good and a lasting happiness, it can be said that every human being also seeks after God, who alone is the highest good and eternal blessedness, Hd. 17:27. But then they nevertheless do not seek
Him in the right way and not there where He is to be found. The heathen religions know of no covenant of grace, they do not know the person of Christ, and all hold the way of works to be the via salutis. The principle of Heathendom is, negatively, the denial of the true God and of the gift of his grace, and, positively, the delusion of being able, by one's own power and wisdom, to acquire salvation for oneself. Come, let us build a city and a tower, whose top be in heaven, and let us make a name for ourselves, Gen.
11:4. Whether the works by which Heathendom seeks the way to salvation bear a more ceremonial or a more ethical character, whether they are more positive or more negative in nature, always the human being is nevertheless his own savior; all religions, outside the Christian, are autosoteric. In the
lowest religions the consciousness of sin is almost entirely lost and peace, reconciliation, happiness are obtained by magical acts and formal ceremonies; higher religions add to them all kinds of moral duties and make salvation dependent on their fulfillment. Islam too knows no proper [426] redemption but binds entrance into paradise to orthodox faith and to the observance of the prescribed prayers and good works. In Buddhism salvation consists in the killing, to be effected by various means, of the desire for being, Falke, Buddha, Moh., Christus II 1897 S. 103 f. And philosophy has not brought it any further; the only way to salvation is the path of virtue, moral self-perfection; even Kant and Schopenhauer, who with a view to innate sinfulness deemed a rebirth necessary, have nevertheless again ended by making an appeal to the will, the wisdom, and the power of the human being.
Wholly different is the opinion of Scripture. Already in the O. T. it is God, who immediately after the fall out of grace sets enmity between man and serpent and transfers man to his side, Gen. 3:15, who chooses Abraham and the people of Israel born from him as his possession, Gen. 12:1, Ex. 15:13,
16, 19:4, 20:2, Deut. 7:6v., who establishes the covenant with it and bestows his laws upon it, Gen 15:1, 17:2, Ex. 2:24, 25, Deut. 4:5-13, who gives the blood upon the altar for atonement, Lev. 17:11, and expends everything upon his vineyard, Jes. 5, Jer. 2:21. But by virtue of that election and on the foundation of that covenant the people are now also obligated, on pain of the curse of the law, Deut. 27:6, to walk before God in uprightness and to keep his commandments, Gen. 17:1, Ex. 20, Deut. 10:15,
16 etc. The covenant relationship did not depend on that keeping of the law as a preceding condition; it was no covenant of works but rested only on God's electing love. But it nevertheless had to receive its proof and seal in
the walk according to the Lord's law. For it could, on Israel's side, not be accepted with a perfect heart and thus not become true reality in Israel, except through such a faith as also had love and desire to walk in the way of the covenant. The covenant, if it is not an idea but reality, includes the obligation and the inclination to live according to the demand of the covenant. But therefore it also speaks for itself that the people could assume a very different attitude toward the covenant and its law. There were antinomian godless persons, forerunners of the Sadducees, who cared neither for God nor his commandment, and mocked the pious, Ps. 14:2,
[427] 36:2, 42:4, 11, 94:2, Mal. 2:17, 3:14; there were Pharisaically minded persons, who laid the emphasis on outward keeping of the law and connected righteousness and salvation with that, Am. 6:1, Jer. 7:4. But between these two stood the few faithful, the sincere pious, who were by no means indifferent to the Lord's law, on the contrary meditated on it the whole day and loved it with all their soul, but who nevertheless did not let their righteousness and salvation depend on its keeping. For although it is the case that they very often appeal very strongly to their righteousness and call upon God to do them justice, Ps. 7:9, 17:1v., 18:21, 26:1v., 35:34,
41:13, 44:18, 21, 71:2, 119:121, 2 Kon. 20:3, Job 16:17, Neh. 5:19, 13:14 etc., yet those same persons at the same time humbly make confession of their sins, invoke God's forgiveness and plead on his grace, Ps. 31:10, 11,
32:1v., 38:2v., 40:13, 41:5, 130:3, 5, Jes. 6:5, 53:4, 64:6, Jer. 3:25, Mich.
7:9, Neh. 1:6, 9:33, Dan. 9:5, 7, 18, etc. The righteousness of these pious is not a personal quality, but a property of the cause which they uphold; they have the right on their side, because they rely on God, deel II 197. 198. This trust in God is the essential thing which in the O. T. makes the righteous righteous; they believe in God, האמין, Gen. 15:6, Ex. 14:31, 2 Chr. 20:20,
Jes. 28:16, Hab. 2:4, trust in him, בטח, Ps. 4:6, 9:11, take refuge in him, חסה,
Ps. 7:2, 18:3, fear him, ירא, Ps. 22:24, 25:12, hope in him, יחל, הוחיל, Ps.
31:25, 33:18, expect it from him, ִקָּוה, Ps. 25:21, wait for him, ִחָּכה, Ps.
33:20, lean on him, סמוך, Ps. 172:8, נכון, Ps. 57:8, cling to him, דבק, חׁשק, Ps.
91:14, 2 Kon. 18:6 etc. This faith is reckoned for righteousness, Gen. 15:6, just as elsewhere the keeping of God's commandments is called righteousness, Deut. 6:25, 24:13. Now that this subjective righteousness, which essentially consists in trust in God, is also a fruit of God's grace and an operation of his Spirit, does not, from the nature of the case, come to light so clearly in the O. T. as yet. But nevertheless the data for this are not lacking either. Of a righteousness of one's own there is never any mention in Israel; it is chosen notwithstanding its stubbornness, Deut. 9:4-6. God is the source of all life and light, [428] of all wisdom, power, salvation, Deut.
8:17, 18, Ps. 36:10, 68:20, 21, 36, 73:25, 26, Jer. 2:13, 31. Not unto us, but unto thy name give honour, is the prayer of Israel's pious, Ps. 115:1; humility is the disposition of their soul, Gen. 32:10, Ps. 116:12, a broken and contrite heart are pleasing to God, Ps. 51:19, Jes. 57:15. Not to man but to God is every gift always ascribed and for everything thanks rendered; everything is called upon to praise him; everything is desired from him in prayer, not only deliverance from dangers but also knowledge of God's law, enlightenment of the eyes etc. God is indeed he who has mercy on whom he will, Ex. 33:19, and writes in his book who shall live, Ex. 32:33. He promises, without any condition, that he will be their God and they his people, Ex. 19:6, Lev. 26:12, and that he will always again, after unfaithfulness and apostasy on Israel's side, have mercy on them, give conversion and life, Ex. 32:30-35, Num. 14, 16:45-50, Lev. 26:40-44, Deut.
4:31, 8:5, 30:1-7, 32:36-43, Neh. 9:31. He forgives the sins for his name's
sake, Ex. 34:7 etc., and sends his H. Spirit, who is the worker of all spiritual life, Num. 11:25, 29, Neh. 9:20, Ps. 51:13, 143:10, Jes. 63:10, cf. deel II 230. And when history then teaches that Israel repeatedly profanes, abandons, destroys the covenant, Deut. 31:20, 1 Kon. 11:11, 19:10, 14, Jer.
22:9, 32:32 etc., then prophecy proclaims that God on his part will never break the covenant and will never forsake his people. He cannot do it for his name's and his glory's sake before the Heathen, Num. 14:16, Deut. 32:26,
27, 1 Sam. 12:22, Joel 2:17-19, Jes. 43:21, 25, 48:8-11, Jer. 14:7, 20, 21, Ezech. 20:43, 44, 36:32. It is an eternal covenant, which cannot totter, because it is fixed in God's lovingkindness, 2 Kon. 13:23, 1 Chron. 16:17,
Ps. 89:1-5, 105:20, 106:45, 111:5, Jes. 54:10. He, as it were, stands surety for both parties, not only for himself but also for his people, and he will thus establish a new covenant, not cause his Word and Spirit to depart from them, forgive their sins for his name's sake, pour out his Spirit upon all, grant them a heart of flesh, write the law in their inward parts and cause them to walk in his statutes, Deut. 30:6, Jes. 44:3, 59:21, Jer. 24:7, 31:31v.,
Ezech. 11:19, 16:60, 18:31, 36:26, 39:29, Joel 2:28, Mich. 7:19 etc., cf. deel
II 181. 182. [429]
2. Preceded by John the Baptist, Jesus appears in the N. T. with the preaching of the kingdom of heaven. That kingdom is, on the one hand, represented as a treasure, which is kept in the heavens and is distributed as a reward to the righteous, Mt. 6:20, 13:43, 19:21, 25:46. In order to become partaker of it, another, better righteousness is necessary than that of the Pharisees, Mt. 5:20; it must be sought before all things, Mt. 6:33, be bought at the cost of everything, 13:44-46, 19:21, Mk. 9:43-47, 10:28, 29. But this representation passes over into another; the eschatological significance of the kingdom of God gives way to the religious-ethical. For, work and
reward stand here in no proportion; the kingdom of God in the eschatological sense is indeed called a reward, but it so far surpasses all work in value, that every notion of reward falls away, Mt. 19:29, 20:13-15,
25:21, Mk. 10:30, especially Luk. 17:10. The righteousness which is required in order to enter into the kingdom is itself a good of that kingdom,
Mt. 6:33, just as also the forgiveness of sins, Mt. 26:28, Luk. 1:77, 24:47 etc. And this kingdom with all its goods, forgiveness, righteousness, eternal life, is near and comes by God's will, Mk. 1:15, 9:1; it is a gift, which He bestows out of grace, Mt. 25:34, Luk. 12:32; and He bestows it, not upon the righteous but upon the publicans and sinners, Mt. 9:13, upon the lost,
Mt. 18:11, upon the poor etc., Mt. 5, upon the little children, Mt. 18:3, Mk.
10:15; and theirs is already here on earth the kingdom of heaven, Mt. 9:15, 11:11, 13:16, 17, 23:13, Mk. 10:15, Luk. 17:21. In order to become partaker of that kingdom, therefore, no righteousness of one's own is necessary, but only conversion, μετανοια, resipiscentia, mentis mutatio, change of mind, and faith, πιστις, i.e. the accepting of and trusting in the gospel of the kingdom as a gift of God to the lost, Mk. 1:15, and thus trust in God, Mk.
11:22, in Jesus' word and power, Mt. 8:10, 9:2, Mk. 4:40, in Jesus' person as Messiah, Mt. 27:42, Mk. 9:42, Joh. 1:12, 2:11, 6:29, 17:8, 20:30, Hd.
9:22, 17:3, 18:5 etc. But also this μετανοια and πιστις are themselves again gifts of grace of God, Mt. 11:25, 27, 15:13, 16:17, Luk. 10:22, Joh. 6:44,
65, 12:32, so that only those who are of the truth, Joh. 8:43, 47, 12:39, 18:37, who have been given by the Father to the Son, 6:37v., 17:2, [430] 6,
9, 10:26, 11:52, who have already been born again, 1:12, 13, 8:47, come to faith.
In the apostolic proclamation all this is worked out much more broadly.
The relation of the objective acquisition and the subjective application of
salvation then comes more clearly to light. If Jesus has died and been raised, then it becomes clear to his disciples that the kingdom which he preached, with all its goods of forgiveness, righteousness, and eternal life, has been acquired through his suffering and death; and that precisely to that end he has been raised and glorified by the Father, in order that he might apply these benefits to his own. The application is inseparable from the acquisition. It is one work that has been entrusted to the Mediator; and he will not rest before he can hand over the whole kingdom, completed, to the Father. But yet, however unbreakably acquisition and application of salvation also cohere, there is distinction. The former Christ brought about on earth, in the state of humiliation, through his suffering and death; the latter he accomplishes from heaven, in the state of exaltation, through his prophetic, priestly, and kingly activity at the right hand of the Father.
Therefore he also exercises this application of salvation through the H.
Spirit. He himself, through his exaltation, has become Lord from heaven, a life-giving Spirit, 1 Cor. 15:45, 47, 2 Cor. 3:17. The Spirit, who from his conception onward had qualified him and had been poured out upon him more and more, has now become the principle of his whole glorified life; all natural, earthly life he has laid aside; he is now the Lord from heaven, the life-giving Spirit; the Spirit of God has become his Spirit, has become Spirit of Christ. Connected with this is the word in Joh. 7:39, that the Spirit was not yet, because Christ was not yet glorified. It cannot be meant by this that the H. Spirit did not yet exist or did not yet work before the glorification of Christ, for already in the O. T. there was no power and no gift except through the H. Spirit, part II 230; Christ himself was anointed with that Spirit without measure, Joh. 3:34; and also Elizabeth and John the Baptist are called filled with that Spirit, Luk. 1:15, 41. The meaning can be no other
than that the Spirit, although he earlier also bestowed many gifts and worked many powers, nevertheless only after the glorification of Christ
[431] has personally remained dwelling in the congregation of believers as in his temple. It is with the H. Spirit as with Christ himself. The Son of God was from eternity anointed as Mediator; he worked as prophet, priest, and king already in the days of the O. T.; but he nevertheless became flesh only in the fullness of time. Thus there is also a fullness of time for the H. Spirit.
When Christ has completed his work, he has not only himself become a life-giving Spirit, but the Spirit of God, of Father and Son, has also fully become the Spirit of Christ, whom he sends out, through whom he as Lord from heaven carries out his work on earth, who takes his place, takes everything from what is his, glorifies him, and causes him himself to dwell in the congregation in a spiritual manner. The H. Spirit, namely, brings about not a distancing but the most intimate communion between Christ and his congregation. Indeed he is distinguished from Father and Son, ἀλλος παρακλητος, Joh. 14:16, mentioned in particular alongside both, Mt. 28:19,
1 Cor. 12:4, 2 Cor. 13:13, Op. 1:4. But he is also one with them in essence and can therefore fully make their communion shared by the believers. His activity, after all, by no means consists only in the communication of the benefits of Christ. If Christ through his suffering and death had acquired only the forgiveness of sins, then it would be enough that the H. Spirit strengthened the proclamation of this gospel, Joh. 15:26, 27, Hd. 5:32, 1
Cor. 2:4, 2 Cor. 4:13, 1 Thess. 1:5, 6, 1 Petr. 1:12, convinced the world of wrong, Joh. 16:8-11, worked faith in the hearts, 1 Cor. 2:5, 12:3, Ef. 1:19,
20, 2:8, Col. 2:12, Phil. 1:29, 1 Thess. 2:13, and assured the believers of their sonship, Rom. 8:15. 16. But this objective, judicial benefit of forgiveness is not the only one; it is supplemented by the ethical and
mystical benefit of sanctification. Christ not only takes away the guilt of sin but also breaks its power. He has, one for all, died, so that the living would no longer live for themselves but would live for Christ, 2 Cor. 5:15. In the satisfaction to the law, which is the power of sin, i.e. in forgiveness, the power of sin is also in principle broken; where righteousness is, there is also life; Rom. 3-5 is followed by Rom. 6-8. Christ has not only died, but he has also risen and been glorified; [432] he is and remains the Lord from heaven, the life-giving Spirit, who not only died for the congregation but also dwells and works in it. This communion now between Christ and the congregation is brought about and maintained by the H. Spirit. The H. Spirit is therefore not only the one who works faith and assures of sonship, but he is also author of a new life; and faith is not merely acceptance of a testimony of God but also beginning and principle of a holy walk, 2 Cor. 5:17, Ef. 2:10,
4:24, Col. 3:9, 10. In and through the Spirit Christ himself comes to his own, Joh. 14:18, lives in them, Rom. 8:9-11, 2 Cor. 13:5, Gal. 2:20, Ef.
3:17, Col. 3:11, just as conversely the believers through that Spirit are in Christ, live, think, act, Joh. 17:21, Rom. 8:1, 9, 10, 12:5, 1 Cor. 1:30, 2 Cor.
5:17, Gal. 3:28, 6:25, Ef. 1:13, Col. 2:6, 10; παντα και ἐν πασιν Χριστος Col. 3:11, cf. Deismann, Die neut. Formel ἐν Χρ. Ιησου 1892, who, however, wrongly takes the formula always in a local sense. And not only
Christ, but also God himself comes through that Spirit to make his dwelling in them and fills them with his fullness, so that he may finally be all in all,
Joh. 14:23, 1 Cor. 3:16, 17, 6:19, 15:28, 2 Cor. 6:16, Ef. 2:22. And through communion with the person of Christ, the H. Spirit also effects communion with all his benefits, with his σοφια, 1 Cor. 2:6-10, δικαιοσυνη, 1 Cor. 6:11, ἁγιασμος, ib., Rom. 15:16, 2 Thess. 2:13, ἀπολυτρωσις, Rom. 8:2, 23. He assures the believers of their sonship, Rom. 8:14-17, Gal. 4:6 and of the
love of God, Rom. 5:5; he makes them free from the law and causes them together to appear in the world as one congregation, living by a principle of their own, standing under a head of their own, Hd. 2, 2 Cor. 3, Gal. 4:216:10, above p. 217. He joins the believers into one body, 1 Cor. 12:13, leads them to one Father, Rom. 8:15, Gal. 4:6, Ef. 2:18, brings all to the confession of Christ as Lord, 1 Cor. 12:3, makes them one of heart and soul,
Hd. 4:31, 32, Gal. 5:22, Phil. 2:1, 2, and causes them together to grow up to a perfect man in Christ, 1 Cor. 3:10-15, Ef. 4:1-16, Col. 2:19. He is the author of regeneration, Joh. 3:5, 6, Tit. 3:5, life, Joh. 6:63, 7:38, 39, Rom.
8:2, 2 Cor. 3:6, illumination, Joh. 14:17, 15:26, 16:13, 1 Cor. 2:6-16, 2 Cor.
[433] 3:12, 4:6, Ef. 1:17, 1 Joh. 2:20, 4:6, 5:6, gifts, Rom. 12:3-8, 1 Cor.
12:4v., renewal and sanctification, Rom. 8, Gal. 5:16, 22, Ef. 3:16, sealing and glorification, Rom. 8:11, 23, 2 Cor. 1:22, 5:5, Ef. 1:13, 14, 4:30.
3. That faith in Christ was the way to salvation was, of course, established in the Christian church from the beginning. He who does not believe in the blood of Christ is condemned, Ign., Smyrn. 6. We are not justified by ourselves, by our wisdom or piety or good works, but by faith, Clem., 1
Cor. 32. Justin says that no one is saved except through the merits of Christ, who took the curse upon himself and made satisfaction for all, Dial. c. 95, who redeems all who do penance and believe, ib. c. 100, and he speaks repeatedly of a grace that precedes our works, enlightens us and leads to faith, Dial. c. 119. Apol. I 10. Irenaeus binds salvation not only to faith in Christ, e.g. adv. haer. IV 2, 7. V 19, 1, but also says that the Holy Spirit has been sent in order to work out the will of the Father in human beings and to renew them, and that that Spirit is necessary like the rain and the dew, to make the land fruitful, III 17, cf. V 10, 2. Even Origen testifies that the will of man is of itself unfit to be converted, nisi divino vel juvetur vel muniatur
auxilio. God is prima et praecipua causa operis, de princ. III 1, 18 cf. 2, 5.
Still more strongly the moral corruption of man and the necessity of the grace of the Holy Spirit are expressed by the Latin patres, Tertullian,
Cyprian, Ambrose, to whose statements Augustine therefore also appeals, c. duas epist. Pelag. IV 8-10. Thus the first-mentioned says: haec erit vis divinae gratiae, potentior utique natura, habens in nobis subjacentem sibi liberam arbitrii potestatem, de an. 21. From Cyprian, Test. III 4 are the words repeatedly cited by Augustine: in nullo gloriandum quando nostrum nihil sit. Ambrose already knows an inward grace, which works upon the will and prepares it: a Deo praeparatur voluntas hominum; that God is honored by the saints is God's grace, in Lucam I 10. Yet the doctrine of the application of salvation in the early times was very little developed and in part was also already early led into wrong paths. Although there are [434] here and there some testimonia veritatis evangelicae, on the whole the gospel was nevertheless soon conceived as a new law. Faith and conversion were indeed generally regarded as a necessary way to salvation; but these nevertheless ultimately lay in the freedom of man. Salvation was indeed objectively acquired by Christ, but in order to become partaker of it, the free cooperation of man was necessary. Faith was as a rule nothing more than the conviction of the truth of Christianity, and conversion soon took on the character of a penance that made satisfaction for sins. The sins committed before baptism were indeed forgiven in baptism; but those after baptism had to be made good by penance. Indeed the poenitentia was also still many times regarded as a heartfelt sorrow over sin, but the emphasis nevertheless fell ever more on the outward deeds in which it had to manifest itself, such as praying, fasting, giving alms, etc., and these good works were conceived as a satisfactio operis. The whole soteriology was externalized.
As the way of salvation there counted not the application of salvation by the Holy Spirit to the heart of the sinner, but the praestatie of so-called good, often wholly arbitrary works. The imitation of Christ consisted in imitating and copying the life and suffering of Christ, which was vividly painted before the eyes; martyrs, ascetics, monks were the best Christians, Cf. besides the dogmatics-historical works of Münscher-v. Coelln, Hagenbach,
Schwane, Harnack etc., Vossius, Hist. Pelag. 1. 3. Wiggers, Aug. u. Pelag. I 440 f. Suicerus, s. v. πιστις, ἀναγεννησις, μετανοια. Landerer, Das
Verhältniss von Gnade und Freiheit in der Aneignung des Heils, Jahrb. f. d.
Th. 1857 S. 500-603. Wörter, Die chr. Lehre über das Verhältniss von Gnade u. Freiheit von d. ap. Zeiten bis auf Aug. Freiburg 1856. Dr. H.
Wirth, Der Verdienstbegriff in der Chr. Kirche. I Der Verdienstbegriff bei Tert. Leipzig 1892.
Much more than one of his predecessors, Pelagius deviated from the doctrine of grace; he abandoned the Christian foundation on which they all still stood and renewed the self-sufficient principle of paganism, specifically of the Stoa. For not only did he cut off every connection between Adam's and our sin, so that neither guilt nor stain nor even death was a consequence of the first transgression; but Christianity also lost its
[435] absolute significance; salvation was not bound to Christ but could also be obtained through the lex naturae and the lex positiva. Of a gratia interna, of a regenerating grace of the H. Spirit, which not only illuminated the understanding but also bent the will, there could therefore, with Pelagius, be no question. To be sure he spoke of grace, but by that he understood only: a) the posse in natura, the gift of being able to will, which God bestowed on every human being, gratia creans, b) the objective grace of the preaching of the law or of the gospel, and of the example of Christ,
which addressed itself to the understanding of the human being and instructed him concerning the way of salvation, gratia illuminans, and c) the forgiveness of sins and the future salvation, which would be bestowed on the human being who believed and did good works. Grace in the firstmentioned sense was thus proper to all human beings; grace in the second sense was not absolutely necessary, but served only to make the acquisition of salvation easier for the human being, it was no gratia operans but only an adjutorium for the human being; it was also not bestowed on all but only on such as had made themselves worthy of it by the good use of their natural powers; it was no gratia praeparans (excitans), nor even a gratia irresistibilis, which rather is a fatum sub nomine gratiae; and finally it was not necessary and was not bestowed by God for every good deed, ad singulos actus, but only for some; many good works were performed by the human being without any grace, Wiggers I 220 f. Semi-Pelagianism moderated this system and taught that the human being, through Adam's sin, had indeed not become spiritually dead but had nevertheless become sick, that his freedom of will had not been lost but had nevertheless been weakened, and that the human being thus, in order to do the good and to obtain salvation, had need of the assistance of divine grace. But that grace, which illuminates the understanding and supports the will, may never be detached from but must always be considered in connection with the freedom of will left to the human being. Grace and will work together, and indeed in such a way that grace, according to God's intention, is universal and destined for all, but in fact benefits only those who make good use of their freedom of will. Nostrum est veile, Dei perficere. Sometimes now, as with Paul, grace may precede; [436] as a rule, however, the will is the first; the beginning of faith and perseverance in it is a matter of the will; grace is
only necessary for the increase of faith; God helps him who helps himself.
A gratia operans, irresistibilis does not exist; and even a gratia praeveniens is as a rule denied, Wigers, II 359 f.
4. Proceeding from man's absolute moral corruption through Adam's sin and from his complete incapacity for any spiritual good, Augustine also arrived at a wholly different doctrine of grace. Many times he also designates the objective benefits, the gospel, baptism, the forgiveness of sins, etc., by the name of grace. But this grace is not enough; there is still another needed, a gratia interna, spiritalis, which enlightens the understanding and bends the will. At first Augustine had still taught otherwise, namely, that God called us but that believing was our affair, thus in his writing de diversis quaestionibus from the year 386 and de libero arbitrio 388-395. But later, about 396, he came, especially through 1 Cor.
4:7, to another insight, de div. qu. adv. Simpl. ± 397. And now he says that grace not only consists in an outward preaching of law and gospel, which teaches and admonishes us, and in that sense offers us help, but it is especially an occulta inspiratio Dei, inspiratio fidei et timoris Dei, an adjutorium bene agendi adjunctum naturae atque doctrinae per inspirationem flagrantissimae et luminosissimae caritatis, de gratia Christi
35, a subministratio virtutis, ib. 2, an inspiratio caritatis per Spiritum Sanctum, ib. 39. Itself a fruit of election, ipsius praedestinationis effectus, de praed. sanct. 10, it is distributed, not according to merit but according to God's mercy, de dono pers. 12. c. duas ep. Pelag. I 24. Therefore it is of itself gratuita; it would not be gratia, if it were not bestowed gratis, de pecc. orig. 24. The H. Spirit blows whither He wills, non merita sequens sed merita faciens, ib. Grace precedes all merits, it is a gratia praeveniens, praeparans, antecedens and operans; nolentem praevenit, ut velit, Enchir.
32. It enlightens the understanding inwardly, removes the coecitas from it, de pecc. mer. I 9; works faith, which is a gift of God, and creates in man the good will, the love for the good and the ability to do the good and removes the infirmitas from it; fateamur, [437] interna atque occulta, mirabili ac ineffabili potestate operari Deum in cordibus hominum, non solum veras revelationes sed etiam bonas voluntates, de gratia Chr. 24. This grace is moreover irresistibilis, it works indeclinabiliter and insuperabiliter upon the will of man, de corr. et gr. 12; it is rejected by no heart, however hard, a nullo corde duro respuitur, God by grace takes away the heart of stone and gives a heart of flesh in its place, de praed. sanct. 8. The elect, who receive it, can by it not only come to Christ, but they also actually come to Him.
But this is not to be understood as if God by grace suppressed or destroyed the free will of man; on the contrary, grace makes the will precisely free from the slavery of sin. Liberum ergo arbitrium evacuamus per gratiam?
Absit, sed magis liberum arbitrium statuimus. Sicut enim lex per fidem, sic liberum arbitrium per gratiam non evacuatur sed statuitur quia gratia sanat voluntatem, de spir. et litt. 30 cf. 33. 34. de gratia et lib. arb. de civ. XIV 11. c. duas ep. Pel. I 2. Therefore Augustine could also say, consentire vocationi
Dei vel ab ea dissentire, propriae voluntatis est, de spir. et litt. 34, for both, he who believes and he who does not believe, do that voluntarily, nemo credit nisi volens. Yet he was so far from, by this statement, finally placing the decision again into the hands of man, that he immediately continues: this word does not weaken but confirms the word of the apostle: what do you have that you have not received. Accipere quippe et habere anima non potest dona, de quibus hoc audit, nisi consentiendo; ac per hoc, quid habeat et quid accipiat Dei est; accipere autem et habere utique accipientis et habentis est. Iamsi ad illam profunditatem scrutandam quisquam nos
coarctet, cur illi suadetur ut persuadeatur, illi autem non ita, duo sola occurrunt interim quae respondere mihi liceat; o altitudo divitiarum, et: numquid iniquitas apud Deum? de spir. et litt. 34. And as the beginning, so also the progress of faith and of love is to be ascribed only to God's grace; the gratia operans passes over into the gratia cooperans, consequens, subsequens, it works not only the willing but also the working and the accomplishing. Without Christ we can do nothing; and therefore, ut incipiamus, dictum est: misericordia ejus praeveniet me, ut perficiamus, dictum est: misericordia [438] ejus subsequetur me, c. duas ep. Pel. II 9. It is God, qui praeparat voluntatem et cooperando perficit quod operando incipit.... Ut ergo velimus, sine nobis operatur; cum autem volumus, et sic volumus ut faciamus, nobiscum cooperatur; tamen sine illo vel operante ut velimus vel cooperante cum volumus, ad bona pietatis opera nihil valemus, de gr. et lib. arb. 17. Volentem subsequitur ne frustra velit, Enchir. 32. And that grace is needed not for a few but for all good deeds; voluntas hominis
Dei gratia ad omne bonum actionis, sermonis, cogitationis adjuvatur, c. duas ep. Pel. II 5. Objectively and subjectively the work of salvation from beginning to end is a work of God's grace and of his grace alone. Cf.
Wiggers, I 244 f. Luthardt, Die Lehre vom freien Willen 1863 S. 30 f.
Pelagianism was condemned at the Synod of Carthage 418, whose canons were approved by Pope Zosimus and later by Coelestinus I, further at the council of Ephesus 431 and at the synod of Orange 529; at this latter synod semipelagianism was also rejected and its canons were ratified by Bonifacius II, Denzinger, Enchir. n. 64 sq., cf. deel II 322v. Thereby the ecclesiastical doctrine was established, that the whole man has been corrupted by Adam's sin, and that both, initium and augmentum fidei, are to be ascribed not to ourselves, to our natural powers, but to the grace of God,
which not only teaches us what we have to do and to refrain from, but also grants us, ut quod faciendum cognoverimus, etiam facere diligamus atque valeamus, Denzinger n. 68; to the infusio, operatio, inspiratio, illuminatio of the H. Spirit in us, who anticipates our will, prepares it, restores it from unbelief to faith (corrigens), and makes us will and work, ib. 147 sq. The necessity of the gratia interna, praeveniens has since been taught by all.
Also the synod at Chiersy 853, which condemned Gottschalk, confessed: habemus liberum arbitrium ad bonum, praeventum et adjutum gratia,.... gratia liberatum et de corrupto sanatum, ib. 280. just as Rabanus said, that God Spiritu Sancto intus regit et zelo spiritali foris confortat, bij
Weiszäcker, Jahrb. f. d. Th. 1859 S. 545. Scholasticism walked in this same track. Lombardus says, that man through sin has lost freedom of will, and that he non valet erigi ad bonum efficaciter volendum [439] vel opere implendum, nisi per gratiam liberetur et adjuvetur; liberatur quidem ut velit et adjuvatur ut perficiat, Sent. II dist. 25, cf. comm. op. Ef. 2:4-10, Rom.
5:1, 2, 6:23 enz. According to Thomas, man without grace can indeed do all sorts of naturally good things, S. Theol. II 1 qu. 109 art. 1 en 2, but he has need of grace, ut sanetur et ut bonum supernaturalis virtutis operetur, art. 2, in order to love God, art. 3, in order to keep the law, art. 4, in order to obtain eternal life, art. 5, in order to prepare himself for the grace of justification, art. 6, in order to rise from sins, art. 7, in order to be able not to sin, art. 8, and he has need each time of new grace, in order to know and to do the good, art. 9 and to persevere therein, art. 10. And likewise Trent determined, that adults, in order to prepare themselves for the grace of justification, have need of the gratia praeveniens, so that they, qui per peccata a Deo aversi erant, per ejus ezeitantem atque adjuvantem gratiam ad convertendum se ad suam ipsorum justificationem.... disponentur, VI 5.
Rome thus decidedly teaches the necessity of the gratia praeveniens (actualis, excitans) and thus rejects pelagianism and semipelagianism, which ascribed the initium and augmentum fidei to the powers of natural man. Now it can indeed be asked, whether Rome under that gratia praeveniens understands something more than the external calling of the gospel, which works morally upon understanding and will, and which was also acknowledged by Pelagius c. s. Sometimes, to be sure, the description of that grace is very weak; Trent identifies it with the calling, qua nullis eorum existentibus meritis vocantur, ib. But nevertheless Rome seems to understand under that gratia praeveniens an operation of the H. Spirit upon understanding and will. The synod of Orange spoke of a Sancti Spiritus infusio et operatio in nobis; Trent called it excitans and described it by the words: tangente Deo cor hominis per Spiritus Sancti illuminationem, ib. cf. can. 3. Thomas says, that that grace, by which an adult prepares himself for justification, does not consist in aliqua habitualis gratia but indeed in an operatio Dei ad se animam convertentis, I qu. 62 art. 2 ad 3, an auxilium
Dei interius moventis sive inspirantis bonum propositum, II 1 qu. 109 art. 6 qu. 112 art. 2 III qu. 89 art. 1 ad 2. Bonaventura also calls it gratia gratis data and [440] says, that man has need of it for preparation for justification and that it excitat his free will, Brevil. V 3. Bellarminus describes it as a gratia auxilii specialis, as a motio or actio, qua Deus hominem movet ad operandum, de gratia et lib. arb. I c. 2, and sets it as special auxilium, gratia extrinsecus excitans et adjuvans over against the gratia intus inhabitans, de gratia infusa, Spiritus S. in nobis inhabitans, de justif. I c. 13. There was also, concerning the essence of that preparatory grace, great difference among the theologians; the Thomists held it to be a qualitas physica supernaturaliter infusa, entitas quaedam physica; Molina, Lessius, Ripalda
conceived it as an illustratio mentis et inspiratio voluntatis; Suarez, Tanner e. a. thought, that it was not something created, but that the H. Spirit himself immediately moved the will. But nevertheless it is generally conceived as a gratuitum auxilium, donum Dei internum et supernaturale, as an illustratio mentis and motio immediata voluntatis, which adds to man not only vires morales but also vires physicas and enables him to prepare himself for justification, Theol. Wirceb. VII 262, 268. Perrone V p. 6.
Kleutgen, Theol. d. Vorz. II 152 f. Jansen III p. 8 sq. Pesch, Prael. dogm. V 20. 46. Heinrich, Dogm. Theol. VIII 19 f. Simar 492. Scheeben III 683 f.
5. But with that the rejection of semi-Pelagianism at Rome has also ended; by a detour it is nevertheless brought in again. In the first place,
Rome teaches that freedom of the will has been weakened by sin but not lost, Syn. Araus. can. 8. 13. 25. Trid. VI c. 1 and can. 5; man can without grace do many naturally and civilly good works, which are absolutely not sins; he can know and love God as Creator, lead an honorable life; and even if it is difficult, in the long run, to keep the whole law and to resist all temptations, in itself it is nevertheless not impossible. The homo naturalis is in itself a complete man, part II 525, cf. Pesch, V 66. 100. In the second place, Rome departs from Augustine in that it conceives the gratia praeveniens as a grace which indeed grants the ability to believe but not the believing itself. On the contrary, to every adult who lives under the gospel the gratia praeveniens [441] (actualis) is bestowed, but it stands in the power of man to accept or to reject it. Hoc etiam secundum fidem catholicam credimus, said the synod at Orange c. 25, quod accepta per baptismum gratia omnes baptizati, Christo auxiliante et cooperante, quae ad salutem pertinent, possint et debeant, si fideliter laborare voluerint, adimplere. And Trent declared that man can consent to the gratia
praeveniens and cooperate with it, but can also reject it, VI c. 5 and can. 4.
Among the theologians, however, there was great difference about this. The Augustinians, among whom Berti is the principal one, teach that the gratia praeveniens (actualis, sufficiens) indeed gives the posse but not the velle. In order that man not only can but also will to believe and actually believe, and the gratia sufficiens thus indeed become efficax, for that there is needed a delectatio victrix, which overcomes the opposite carnalis delectatio and makes the posse pass over into velle. The will must therefore be transformed by a delectatio victrix, which is stronger than the concupiscentia. The Thomists, Bannez, Gonet, Lemos, Billuart e. a. likewise say that the gratia sufficiens indeed gives the posse but not the velle and, in order to bring about this latter, must be supplemented by an actio Dei physica, promotio or praedeterminatio physica. Augustinians and Thomists thus agree in this, that the efficacia gratiae does not depend on the will of man but on grace itself, and that upon the delectatio victrix or praedeterminatio victrix the act of faith follows infallibly; they differ, however, in this, that the latter assume an essentially objective distinction between the gratia sufficiens and the gratia efficax, while the former judge that these two do not differ essentially, but that there are degrees in grace, by which a grace which in the one is only sufficiens can in the other, by reason of the lesser hardening, be efficax. But one cannot say that this representation does full justice to the Tridentine assentire vel abjicere. The Molinists therefore let the efficacia of grace depend on the will of man, and the Congruists, such as Bellarminus, de gratia et lib. arb. I 12 IV 14-16, let it be determined by the praevisa gratiae congruentia or incongruentia with the condition and the circumstances of those to whom grace at a certain moment came, cf. part I 92v. and further Theol. Wirceb. VII 375. Perrone, V
138. Liebermann, Instit. theol. II8 338. Jansen III 79. Dens, Theol. II 219.
Schäzler, Neue Unters. über das Dogma v. d. Gnade, Mainz 1867 S. 87 f.
Simar, Dogm. 502. Pesch, Prael. V 136-164. Scheeben, Dogm. IV 1, 1898 S. 202 f.
The Roman doctrine therefore comes down to this: the children born in the church receive in baptism regeneration (justificatio, gratia infusa), but those who hear the gospel at a later age receive the gratia sufficiens, which consists in an illumination of the understanding and a strengthening of the will by the H. Geest. Man can reject this grace, but he can also consent to it.
If he consents to it, the gratia excitans passes over into the gratia adjuvans or cooperans; man cooperates with it in order to prepare himself for the justificatio (gratia infusa, habitualis). This preparation comprises these seven moments, that man, helped by God's grace, begins to believe God's
Word, begins to see that he is a sinner, obtains hope in God's mercy, begins to love Him, begins to hate sin, resolves to have himself baptized and to lead a new life, Trid. VI c. 6. Faith here does not take a central place but is coordinated with the six other praeparationes ad gratiam justificantem; it is therefore nothing other than an assent to the truth of Christianity, i.e. of the doctrine of the church (fides informis) and receives its justifying power only through love (fides caritate formata), which is communicated in the gratia infusa; in itself and taken alone, it cannot justify, but it is called justifying faith only because it is humanae salutis initium, fundamentum et radix omnis justificationis, i.e. the first of the above-mentioned praeparationes. If man now thus prepares himself and has done quod in se est—whether this consists in the good use of his, by grace supported,
Thomas, S. Th. II 1 qu. 109 art. 6 ad 2. qu. 112 art. 3, or also of his natural powers, Thomas, II 1 qu. 98 art. 6. cf. Theol. Wirceb. VII 288. Dens, Theol.
II 209. Pesch, Prael. V 114-120—God cannot refuse him the gratia infusa.
Indeed man has not merited this grace by that preparation, for it far surpasses it in value; but it is nevertheless just, that God reward him who thus does his best, according to a meritum de congruo, with the gratia [443] infusa. This is bestowed on him in baptism and consists in the indwelling of the H. Geest, the infusion of supernatural virtues, the participation in the Divine nature, and is followed by the forgiveness of sins, which together with it constitutes the two parts of justification, Thomas, S. Theol. II 1 qu.
113. The forgiveness of sins is with Rome thus the negative reverse side of the positive renewal of man; sin is forgiven because and insofar as it has been eradicated. When man has now in baptism become a partaker of this gratia infusa, then he can indeed lose it again through mortal sins, and other sins he has to expiate, not only with contritio cordis but also with confessio oris and satisfactio operis; but in the gratia infusa he has nevertheless received the supernatural power to do good works and thereby to merit all subsequent grace, yes even eternal life, according to a meritum de condigno. For the good works that he does flow forth from a supernatural principle and are therefore worthy of a supernatural reward. And from this it becomes clear what this Roman doctrine of grace is ultimately concerned with. Grace serves only to make possible again for man the meriting of heavenly blessedness. That was in principle even the case with Augustine.
Grace, however unmeritedly bestowed, with him consisted not first of all in the forgiveness of sins but in regeneration, in the infusion of love, which enables one to do good works and thus to acquire eternal life. Accepit
(homo) justitiam, propter quam beatitudinem accipere mereretur, de trin.
XIV 15. The merits do not precede grace and faith, but they nevertheless follow upon them, ad Simplic. I qu. 2. Credendo meritum comparatur, 83
qu. qu. 68. Gratia praevenit meritum, non gratia ex merito sed meritum ex gratia; omnia merita praecedit gratia, ut dona Dei consequantur merita mea,
Aug. with Lombardus on Ef. 2:4-10. Ipsa gratia meritur augeri, ut aucta mereatur et perfici, voluntate comitante, non ducente, pedissequa non praevia, Ambrosius with Lombardus on Rom. 5:1, 2. Later, when the doctrine of the image of God as donum superadditum arose, this became still worse. The concept of grace then underwent an important change.
Grace became something that was not only necessary for fallen man; but [444] also Adam had to be elevated by it from an ordinary, natural man to the image of God. After the fall grace thus receives a twofold task, first to deliver man from sin (gratia sanationis, medicinalis), and second, to raise him up to the supernatural order (gratia elevans), Thomas, S. Th. II 1 qu.
109 art. 2. For the first, grace is only accidental, only morally necessary; for the second it is absolutely and physically necessary. The latter therefore pushes the former more and more into the background; the ethical antithesis of sin and grace gives way to the physical one of natural and supernatural.
Grace with Rome is a supernatural, created, physical power, infused into a natural man in a magical manner, through the mediation of priest and sacrament, which raises him up to the supernatural order and enables him, by good works, to merit all subsequent grace and by this way at the end also heavenly blessedness ex condigno.
6. The Roman penitential system brought Luther to his reforming activity.
An entirely new light dawned for him when he came to know the Scriptural meaning of μετανοια. In the first set of seven of his 95 theses, and further in his sermo de poenitentia and Sermon v. Sakr. der Busse, he expounded this meaning of repentance, and taught that the principal part of repentance does not consist in private confession, of which Scripture knows nothing, nor in
satisfaction, for God forgives sins freely, but in a true sorrow over sins, in an earnest resolve to bear Christ's cross, in a new life, and in the word of absolution, i.e. of grace in Christ. The penitent comes to the forgiveness of sins not through satisfaction and priestly absolution, but through trust in the word of God, through faith in God's grace. Not the sacrament, faith justifies. Thus Luther came to place sin and grace in the center of Christian soteriology. The forgiveness of sins does not depend on a repentance which always remains imperfect, but rests in God's promise and becomes ours only through faith, cf. also Köstlin, Luthers Theol. I 44. 190 f. 202 f. 213 f.
223 f. But concerning the relation in which Luther placed repentance and faith to one another, there is [445] great difference. According to Ritschl,
Rechtf. u. Vers. I2 198 f. Luther at first indeed thought that true repentance was fruit of faith in the gospel and of love to God; but later, especially after Melanchthon's Unterricht der Visitatoren of 1528, in order not to foster false security, he would have placed the remorse worked by the law before faith, precisely the reverse of Calvin, who in the first edition of the Institutie would have had remorse precede faith but later, in the Catech. Genev. of 1538 and in the second and following editions of the Institutie, would have had faith precede true remorse, cf. also Harnack, D. G. III2 749 f. Herrmann in Gottschick's Zeits. f. Th. u. K. 1891 S. 28-81. The historical investigation of Lipsius, Luthers Lehre v. d. Busse, Jahrb. f. prot. Theol. 1892 S. 161340, has however brought to light that there can be no question of such a reversal in Luther's doctrine of repentance. The poenitentia with him always consists in two parts: contritio, knowledge of and remorse over sins, worked by the law, and fides, faith in the grace of God in the gospel of Christ. God first breaks the sinner's hard heart through the preaching of the law and then leads him through faith to the comfort of the gospel. But when
the sinner thus comes to know God's grace, then he first receives true love for the good, and from that is born that genuine repentance which remains throughout the whole of life and consists in a dying of the old and rising of the new man. Luther now at one time, over against Roman workrighteousness, lays more emphasis on the fact that true repentance proceeds from faith and embraces the whole of life; and then again, over against antinomianism, more on the fact that true faith is preceded by a breaking of the heart; but in substance Luther's doctrine has always remained the same, contritio (poenitentia in the narrower sense), fides and bona opera are the three parts of the via salutis, cf. Köstlin, ib. I 36. 72, 159. 368. II 75. 493.
496 f., and in Herzog2 3 art. Busse. Sieffert, Die neuesten theol.
Forschungen über Busse u. Glauben, Berlin 1896. This representation is also that of the Lutheran confessional writings, ed. Müller 41. 167. 312.
534. 634 and of the first dogmaticians, Brenz, Strigel, Chytraeus and others up to Gerhard; the order of salvation was treated in these three loci. Now
Luther in this order of salvation in the first period had always proceeded from absolute praedestinatie; but later, without revoking it, he placed the [446] center of gravity in the revelation of God in Christ, in the general offering of salvation, in word and sacrament. Melanchthon from 1527 came to synergism and taught that in conversion the will also cooperates, assentiens nec repugnans verbo Dei, because it has still preserved the facultas applicandi se ad gratiam, Loci, c. de lib. arb. The Formula
Concordiae did indeed expressly reject the doctrine that the will by its own, natural powers can accommodate itself to grace, ed. Müller 607, cf. 608.
713. But it nevertheless taught alongside one another predestination and the impotence of man, ib. 594. 705, and the universality and resistibility of grace, 555. 602, and found the reconciliation in this, that man has still
preserved capacitatem non activam sed passivam, can still go to church etc., and especially in this, that he still patitur (and pati potest), ut Deus in se operetur, ib. 609. 610. Later this was usually worked out in Lutheran theology in such a way that God grants to all who live under the gospel, in baptism or through the preaching of the Word, a gratia sufficiens (motus bonos inevitabiles, irresistibiles), by which the will of man is so liberated and renewed that he either can only not resist, let God's grace work in him unto regeneration and conversion and remain wholly passive under it, or can also positively cooperate with it, Gerhard, Loc. XI n. 56. 57. 81.
Quenstedt, Theol. III 505. 508. 510. 513. Hollaz, Ex. 794. 861 sq. 872 sq.
Buddeus, Inst. theol. 921 sq. Schmid, Dogm. d. ev. l. K. 297-369. Luthardt, Komp. § 57-66. Under the influence of this covert or open synergism the ordo salutis, when it was later expanded and, as with Hollaz with reference to Hd. 26:17, 18, was treated in the loci concerning the gratia vocans, illuminans, convertens, regenerans, justificans, renovans and glorificans, assumed among the Lutherans this form: Christian children, because they cannot yet resist, are regenerated in baptism and receive the gift of faith; others at a later age are first called with a vocatio sufficiens, which is the same for all and provides all with that illumination in the understanding and with that power in the will which enables them not to resist the working of God's grace; in case they do not resist, they are brought by the preaching of the law to contritio (poenitentia, conversio in the narrower sense) and further regenerated and endowed with faith, which is a fruit of regeneration; through faith they are [447] then justified, receive the forgiveness of sins and further successively the adoptio, the unio mystica, the renovatio and the glorificatio. But the Christian life in reality does not proceed so regularly; just as grace in its beginning depends on the will strengthened by
supernatural power, so it remains in its progress and to the end. Grace is always resistible and therefore also, up to the hour of death, losable and also again obtainable, not once but even repeatedly. The center of gravity therefore in this order of salvation lies in man; even if it is ever so strongly expressed that God alone regenerates and converts, it nevertheless depends on man's resisting or not resisting whether God will do that; man has the decision in his hands, he can by resisting nullify the whole work of the Father, the Son and the Spirit; and he keeps that decision in his hands until his death. Still more closely the center of gravity in this order of salvation lies in faith and justification. Calling, remorse, regeneration namely bear only a preparatory character; they are actually not yet benefits of the covenant of grace, they as it were still proceed outside of Christ and serve to lead the sinner to Christ. Only when man believes and through that faith accepts the righteousness of Christ does God see him in Christ, forgive him sins, set him free from the law, adopt him as his child, incorporate him into the communion with Christ etc. Everything depends on faith, and indeed specifically on the act of faith. If man exercises this, then he has everything and everything at once, peace, comfort, life, salvation, but if he neglects this, then everything becomes shaky, unstable, losable. Thus everything is directed to preserving that faith, but just as the Lutheran believer does not let the work of grace arise from eternal election, from the covenant, so he also does not connect it with nature and world and humanity; he is saved in his faith but does not let this have an effect on family and school, society and state. It is enough for him to live in communion with Christ, but he feels no urge to fight under Christ as king. Cf. especially Schneckenburger,
Vgl. Darst. d. luth. u. ref. Lehrbegriffs, 2 Th. 1855 passim.
7. With all the agreement, the order of salvation in Reformed [448] theology nevertheless from the outset bore a wholly different character.
Calvin does indeed treat justification, Inst. III 12-18, and election ib. 21-24, after faith, regeneration, conversion, Christian life, but by that he by no means wishes to indicate that they then first come into being objectively.
The fundamental thought from which Calvin proceeds is a wholly different one; election is an eternal decree, even though man first becomes conscious of it through faith, and the forgiveness of sins rests only in Christ, even though it is first bestowed upon us in faith. For in Calvin the thought repeatedly returns, that there is no communion in the benefits of Christ except through communion in his person, Inst. III 1, 1. 3. 2, 24. 3, 9. 11, 10 etc. Herein in principle all the difference is enclosed, which in the order of salvation exists between Reformed and Lutheran, cf. Heppe, Dogm. d. d.
Prot. II 311-316. Schneckenburger, Vergl. Darst. I 195 II 22. Philippi, Kirchl. Gl. V 115. If it is nevertheless true, that the very first benefit of grace already presupposes the communion in the person of Christ, then the imputation and bestowal of Christ to the congregation precedes everything.
And this is also the Reformed doctrine. Already in eternity, in election, and more closely still in the pactum salutis, a bond has been laid between the mediator and those who have been given to him by the Father. Already then, in the decree of God, a unio mystica has been laid between both and a substitution has come about. By virtue of that covenant Christ has become man and has acquired salvation for his people; he could do that, precisely because he already stood in communion with them, was their surety and mediator, their head and substitute; and the whole congregation, comprehended in him as her head, is objectively with him crucified and died, risen and glorified. All benefits of grace thus lie ready in the person of
Christ for the congregation; everything is accomplished; God is reconciled; nothing is added by man. Reconciliation, forgiveness, justification, unio mystica, sanctification, glorification etc., they do not come into being after and through faith, but in an objective, active sense they are present in Christ; they are fruits of his suffering and dying alone; and on our side they are only accepted through faith. God bestows them and imputes them to the congregation in the decree, in the resurrection of Christ, in the calling [449] through the gospel. In God's time they also come subjectively into the possession of believers. For even though it is the case that man has nothing to add to the work of Christ, Christ himself has by no means yet completed the work assigned to him with the acquisition of salvation. He has undertaken to make his people actually and fully blessed. He does not step down as mediator before he has presented his congregation without spot or wrinkle to the Father. The application of salvation is an equally essential constituent of redemption as the acquisition. Dempta applicatione, redemptio non est redemptio. Christ therefore continues in heaven his prophetic, priestly, and kingly activity. The application of salvation is his work; he is the acting one; he communicates himself and his benefits to his own by a gratia irresistibilis and inamissibilis. Soteriology too is to be considered theologically, as a work of Father, Son, and Spirit. And just as the acquisition of salvation by Christ took place in the way of the covenant, so this also happens with its application. In the first place, the bringing in of the elect is not to be thought individualistically and atomistically, for they have all been given to Christ, are comprehended in the covenant, are in their time born out of Christ, as the body with its members out of the head, and made partakers of all his benefits. The congregation is an organism, not an aggregate; the whole precedes the parts. Some Reformed, Wollebius, Theol.
c. 21-27, Keckermann, Syst. Theol. 1603 p. 370, Brakel, Red. Godsd. I c.
24-29 e. a. therefore even treated the doctrine of the church before that of salvation. This is not necessary, because Reformed theology in the covenant of grace possesses what these theologians meant with this their order; it also confuses the church as body of Christ with the church as institute, as Ritschl also does, when he asserts that Calvin places the church above the order of salvation, Rechtf. u. Vers. I2 216. But it nevertheless expresses a true thought; the covenant of grace does not come into being through the order of salvation but precedes it. In the second place, regeneration, faith, conversion are no preparations, which proceed outside Christ and the covenant of grace and first lead man to Christ. But they are benefits, which already flow forth from the covenant of grace, from the unio mystica, from the bestowal of the person of Christ. The Holy Spirit, who is the author of these [450] benefits, has been acquired by Christ for his own; the imputation of Christ thus precedes the gift of the Spirit. Regeneration, conversion, faith do not first lead to Christ, but are derived from him. In the third place, faith and justification in the Reformed order of salvation do not take that central place which is assigned to them by the Lutherans. For faith in no way brings about the benefit of forgiveness, but only accepts it out of Christ. The emphasis does not fall on the subject and his experiences, but on the objective work of Christ. Faith itself is only a link in the long chain of salvation. It is rooted in election, it is a benefit of the covenant of grace, it is a gift of Christ, it is a fruit of regeneration, it is even as habitus in the children of the covenant and remains in principle also in believers in their falling and stumbling present, it is even in those who are brought in at a later age not worked magically but rather prepared by all kinds of leadings of life; special grace connects itself to general grace in nature. In the fourth
place, this faith brings with it the assurance of salvation, for this lies unshakably fixed in the counsel of God, in the person of Christ, in the covenant of grace. And because sanctification is just as much a benefit of Christ as justification, because the good works in which believers must walk have been prepared by God in Christ, faith cannot remain standing with the forgiveness of sins, but it also extends to the perfection that is in Christ, seeks to confirm and strengthen itself out of the good works as its fruits, girds itself with the courage and the strength, in order not only to live with Christ in hidden communion, but also under him as king to fight against sin, world, and flesh on every terrain and to make everything serviceable to the honor of God's name.
8. But alongside these conceptions of the order of salvation many others also arose. Mysticism, which always and everywhere, in India and Arabia, among Jews and Greeks, among Roman Catholics and Protestants, exhibits the same character, causes everything objective and external to recede in the face of the internal process of salvation. It therefore in Christianity takes little account of Holy Scripture, Christ [451] for us, satisfaction, imputed righteousness, justification, church, sacraments, etc., but places all weight on internal grace, illumination, regeneration, Christ in us, infused righteousness, renewal of the Holy Spirit, etc. By three stages it seeks to attain perfection: καθαρσις (via purgativa, ascese), φωτισμος (via illuminativa, meditatio) and ἐποπτεια (via contemplativa, exstase). When, namely, the soul by asceticism has withdrawn itself from the whole world and by meditation has concentrated itself entirely upon one point, then it becomes partaker of the vision of God, deification, transformation in Christ, etc.; then it loses itself and sinks away in God, cf. Zeller, Philos. d. Gr. V 599 f. Voetius, Exerc. pietatis 56 sq. Hollaz, Ex. theol. 208. 796. 821.
Erbkam, Gesch. d. prot. Sekten 52 f., and further literature in Herzog2 15, 487-504. Directly over against that stands rationalism, which was prepared by Socinianism and Remonstrantism and in the 18th century dominated minds. It sees in Christ no more than a prophet and teacher, who has proclaimed the truth of God and sealed it with his life and death; by imitating Him, the human being, indeed weakened by sin but not powerless, becomes partaker of salvation. The calling, which in the gospel comes to him, therefore exerts upon his understanding and will only a moral influence. If the human being, out of his own free choice, gives heed to that calling, assents to the truth, trusts in God's grace and fulfils Christ's commandments—for in assensus, fiducia and obedientia consists the essence of faith—then he is justified on account of this faith, which in principle includes the whole obedience and is already by God out of grace, for Christ's sake, reckoned as perfect obedience, and upon perseverance becomes partaker of eternal salvation, cf. Fock, der Socin. 651-689. Conf.
Rem. en Apol. Conf. VII. Limborch, Theol. Chr. IV 11 sq. V 8 sq. VI 4 sq.
Wegscheider, Inst. theol. § 146 sq. Bretschneider, Dogm. § 177 f. Knapp, Glaub. II 323 f. 382 f. Reinhard, Dogm. § 130.
In the same way as mysticism and rationalism, in the order of salvation antinomianism and neonomianism stand over against each other.
Antinomianism is in general that tendency which in the first place reduces the application of salvation wholly and entirely to, and identifies it with, the acquisition of salvation. Christ namely [452] has accomplished everything,
He has taken over from us not only our guilt but even the stain of sin, He has acquired for us not only righteousness but also regeneration and sanctification; for the human being therefore nothing remains to be done; repentance, conversion, penance, prayer for forgiveness, the doing of good
works, it is all unnecessary, bears a legalistic character and falls short of the perfection of the offering of Christ. The human being needs only to believe, i.e. to come to the insight that he is justified, regenerated, sanctified, that he is perfect in Christ; the sins which he then still commits are no sins any longer, they are works of the old man, which do not concern the believer as such any more, for this one is perfect in Christ, is freed from the law and glories in grace. Usually, however, antinomianism does not stop here but takes yet a step further back; it first reduces the application of salvation to the acquisition and then in turn reduces this again to the decree of God.
Christ too has not acquired salvation, for this lay ready eternally in God's decree, but He has only revealed God's love; believing is therefore nothing other than laying aside the delusion that God is angry with us; sin consists only in that delusion. Such feelings were formerly proclaimed by the Gnostics, in the Middle Ages by many libertinistic sects and found entrance in the Reformed church among the Hattemists and Hebrews, cf. Hulsius, De hedendaagsche Antinomianerye, 2e dr. 1738. Fruytier, Klaer en kort vertoog van de valsheit en gedeformeertheit van het gevoelen der sogen. Hebreën
1697. M. Leydecker, Hist. en Godg. Oefeningen over de oorsprong, voortgang en gevoelens v. d. oude en nieuwe Antin. 1700. Ypey, Gesch. d. chr. Kerk in de 18e E. VII 290v. J. van Leeuwen in Ned. Archief v. Kerk.
Gesch. VIII 1848 bl. 57-169. van Manen in Gids, Sept. Oct. 1885. It is understandable that this antinomianism found so much entrance precisely in the Reformed church; the Reformed order of salvation shows unmistakably kinship with it. Already from the Reformation onward many, because remissio peccatorum fide non efficitur sed accipitur, had placed justification or the forgiveness of sins before faith and had described the essence of faith as cognitio, certitudo, Luther in Köstlin, Luthers Theol. I 223. Melanchton
in Ritschl, Rechtf. u. Vers. I2 197. Calvin, Inst. III 2, 7. 14. [453] Hyperius,
Meth. Theol. 1574 p. 205. Ursinus on q. 21 Heid. Cat. Olevianus, Verklaring der Apost. geloofsbel. 2e dr. Doesburg 1868 bl. 131. 261. 418.
462 and so forth Pareus, Tossanus, Piscator, Twissus e. a. Above all this view in England, over against the neonomianism gaining ground, was developed with clarity by the so-called antinomians, but who are better designated as antineonomians, John Eaton, The honeycombe of free justification bij Christ alone, London 1642. William Eyre, Vindiciae justificationis gratuitae 1654. Tobias Crisp, Christ alone exalted 1643. John
Saltmarsh, Free grace 1645. Samuel Crisp, Christ. made sin 1691. Thomas Tully, Justificatio paulina sine operibus 1674.
Isaac Chauncy, Neonomianism unmasked 1692. Id. Alexipharmacon, a fresh antidote against neonomian bane 1700, cf. Witsius, Misc. Sacra II 753 sq.
Hoornbeek, Summa Contr. 1653 p. 701. Pfaff, Hist. theol. litt. 257 sq.
Walch, Bibl. theol. sel. II 1069. Id. Einl. in die Religionsstr. auss. d. luth. K.
III 999. In this country this conception of justification as preceding faith, whether then in the decree of God or in the resurrection of Christ or in the promise of the gospel or in the internal calling, and correspondingly also the conception of faith as cognitio and certitudo, was defended by Trigland,
Antapol. 314. Maccovius, Loci c. 69-72. Coll. theol. p. 128. Loc. Comm.
Disp. 1641 p. 309. Voetius, Disp. II 453 sq. V 277 sq. Hoornbeek, Summa Contr. 705, and especially in the 18th century by Holtius, Rechtv. door het geloof 1750. Comrie, Heid. Cat. vr. 21. Id. Brief over de rechtv. des zondaars door de onmidd. toerekening der gerecht, van Christus, nieuwe uitg. Utrecht 1889. Ex. v. h. Ontw. v. Tol., voorrede voor de 7e
Samenspraak. Walch. art. 3. Brahe, Aanm. over de vijf Walch. art. 1758 bl.
60v. Godgeleerde stellingen over de leer der rechtv. des zondaars voor God,
opgesteld door J. J. Brahe, nieuwe uitgave door A. Capadose, Amst. 1833, cf. also Hartmann, Huisbijbel op Rom. 4:5. van Thuynen, Korte Uitlegging van het Geref. geloof 1722. Vrolikhert, Twee Godg. verh. over werkverbond en toerekening van Christus' dad. gehoorz. en over den aard en het wezen des geloofs 1732. B. S. Cremer, Summa theol. supran. 1730. Id. Evang.
Geloofsketen der waarheid 1740. But by no means all could find themselves in this representation. Over against it stood another description of the order of salvation, [454] which can be designated as neonomian and again is to be distinguished into a more rationalistic and into a more pietistic one. The former direction is rooted in principle already in the doctrine of Piscator, that the active obedience of Christ does not belong to satisfaction, and soon became of great significance and influence through the school of Saumur. Camero taught there, that the will always follows the understanding and that therefore for conversion illumination of the understanding is sufficient. Amyraldus made objective grace universal.
Pajon considered an internal grace unnecessary and let the efficacia of the calling, in the manner of Bellarminus, depend on its congruity with the circumstances in which it comes to someone. The consequence of that was that natural inability, covenant of works, immediate imputation of Adam's sin and of Christ's righteousness etc. were denied, faith was joined together with works and thus was conceived as means or ground of justification.
This happened inter alia in England through George Bull, Harmonia apostolica 1670, who indeed was opposed by many but was defended by Morus, Glanville, Whitby, Tillotson, Cave etc., M. Vitringa III 296; in Scotland by the Anti-Marrowmen Simson, Hadow e. a., above p. 395; in America by the followers of Jonathan Edwards, above p. 127; and in this country by Vlak, who in his Eeuwig Evangelie 1684 taught a justification
out of the works of faith, by van den Os 1740, who defined faith as trust in Christ and obedience to his commandments, by J. van den Honert, Verh. van de rechtv. des sondaers uyt en door het geloof, and J. J. Schultens, Uitv.
Waarschuwing op verscheiden stukken der Kategismusverklaaringe van Al.
Comrie 1755 and (Petrus Boddaert), Wolk van getuigen voor de leer de rechtv. door en uit het geloove, verzameld bij gelegenheid van het in 't licht geven der Aanm. over de vijf Walch. art. door J. J. Brahe, who all denied the immediate imputation and placed faith before justification, by Kleman, who in his Orde des heils 1774 assumed such a connection laid by God's wisdom and goodness between the human being's moral actions and the supernatural communication of faith, that all who make a proper use of their natural powers can certainly count on the obtaining of supernatural grace etc. [455] 9. But neo-nomianism also appeared in a pietistic form and then, if not faith and obedience, still made faith and experience a condition of justification. From the beginning there was in the Reformed church and theology a practical direction, which was averse to all scholasticism and laid all emphasis on life. It was especially supported and promoted by the philosopher Petrus Ramus, who was a strong opponent of Aristotle, desired more simplicity in philosophy, and defined theology as doctrina bene vivendi, whose goal is not notitia rerum sed usus et exercitatio, cf. Tideman, in Stud. en Bijdr. op het gebied der hist. Theol. door Moll en de Hoop
Scheffer III 1876 bl. 389-429. This view found acceptance with many Reformed theologians, at Strassburg with Sturm, at Heidelberg with Tremellius, at Herborn with Piscator, in the Netherlands with Snellius,
Scaliger, Jac. Alting, at Cambridge with Perkins, whose pupil Amesius, later professor at Franeker alongside Maccovius, also defined theology as
doctrina Deo vivendi, studium pietatis, seated in the will, cf. Dr. H.
Visscher, Guil. Amesius, Haarlem 1894. Thus there arose a practical, pietistic direction, in England e.g. represented by R. Baxter, A call to the unconverted 1669, Daniel Williams, Gospel truth stated and vindicated
1692, B. Woodbridge, The method of grace in the justification of sinners 1656 and many practical writers, and in this country advocated by many theologians and preachers, Witsius, Vitringa, Lampe, Mel, d'Outrein,
Brakel, Hellenbroek, Smytegelt, Francken, Groenewegen, Borstius, van der Groe, Eswijler, Schortinghuis etc., cf. Heppe, Gesch. d. Piet. u. d. Mystik in der ref. K. Leiden 1879. Göbel, Gesch. d. chr. Lebens in der rh.-westph. ev.
K. 3 Bde 1849-1860. Ritschl, Gesch. des Pietismus, I in der ref. K. 1880. In proportion as conditions in the church became more sorrowful and a dead orthodoxy gained the upper hand, these writers all laid emphasis on the necessity of a true conversion. Birth from believing parents, membership in the church, baptism, the Lord's Supper, orthodox faith was not enough. One had to partake of the true, saving faith, which bore a wholly different character than temporal faith and miracle faith and historical faith. True faith does not arise until after terror before the law, fear of judgment, anxiety over sin have preceded. The essence of faith is also not assent or conviction [456] but consists much more in trust than in knowledge; it is seated more in the heart and the will than in the understanding. And it is not immediately certitudo, certainty; no, as Gomarus, Op. I 654 sq. had already said, a distinction must be made between a refuge-taking and an assured trust; the former alone constitutes the essence of faith, the latter belongs to its well-being and can be added to it much later. That faith as refuge-taking trust, consisting in a hungering and thirsting after Christ and his righteousness, is a condition which precedes justification; it entrusts itself to
Christ in order to be justified; when it has accepted the righteousness of Christ, then it goes with it to God the Father, points Him to his promises, and is justified by Him. Thus it does not proceed so simply and so easily as many suppose; the gospel is not for all people, the offer of salvation is not general, the law is for all, but the gospel is only for certain "qualified" sinners, for those initially graced. No one may believe except he who has first received the freedom from the Holy Spirit to do so; let one beware of an imagined and of a stolen faith! Therefore continual self-examination remains necessary; one can so easily deceive oneself; the distinction is so fine between the regenerate at his worst and the unregenerate at his best; there is so much similarity between false and true grace. Thus the believer always has again to examine himself and to test himself by the marks of spiritual life; the way of salvation is a narrow, constricted way, along which even the righteous are scarcely saved. It is also a long way. From refugetaking to assured trust there is a great distance; between them move many classes and groups of people, discovered, convinced, troubled, desirous of salvation, smalland weak-believers etc. The sealing and assurance as a rule follows only after a long time of doubt and struggle, and then often comes about in an extraordinary way, by a voice, a vision, a suddenly occurring word of comfort of Scripture etc. This pietism in the Reformed church is related to the Lutheran, which had been prepared by Musaeus,
Arnd etc., and also by Reformed writers, such as Baxter, Dyke, Bayle e. a., and then through Spener 1635-1705 became a mighty movement and obtained a great expansion. By preaching, discipline, collegia pietatis and many writings such as Pia desideria oder herzliches Verlangen nach gottgefälliger Besserung der wahren christlichen Kirche 1675 Spener opposed dead orthodoxy. He wanted a return to the grace of regeneration
received in baptism but later lost. Historical faith is insufficient; a living, active faith is necessary for salvation. And one receives this faith only when one learns to know one's sins through the preaching of the law, and has had a long, anxious struggle with devil, world, and flesh, even to the point of despair (Busskampf); then from that true faith comes to Durchbruch. This faith therefore consists not only in assent, but in trust; it is an experience, an experience of the heart, a life of the soul. And as such it is also first a means to justification, then thereafter to reveal itself in a holy life distinguished from the world, even abstaining from the adiaphora. Cf. Walch, Hist. u. theol. Einl. in die Religionsstreit. der ev. luth. K. II 239-436. Ritschl, Gesch. d. Pietismus II 1884. Riggenbach, Herzog2 11, 672 and the literature cited there. In this pietism Zinzendorf 1700-1760 was brought up, and he remained in agreement with it in aversion to dead orthodoxy; but pietism was nevertheless too legalistic for him. Terror before the law and anxiety over sin, though not wrong and sometimes having a preparatory power, are nevertheless not the true thing. True repentance, although the word repentance is less accurate, because it makes one think of punishment, proceeds from the gospel, from the preaching of the suffering Christ. It consists not so much in anxiety and struggle, in lamenting and weeping, but in trust in God's grace. It is a matter of the heart, of feeling. Therefore the heart must be made sensitive, and that happens best through the vivid portrayal of Christ's form of suffering, of his blood and wounds. Thereby as by immediate contemplation, by a deep, living impression, by a Wundenblick, faith is born in the heart, without one having gone through a Busskampf or knowing precisely the hour of one's regeneration. That faith brings about a union, a betrothal, a marriage between Christ and the soul, makes the heart swim in grace, i.e. in Jesus' blood, as in its element, and
makes the believer always live in the liebe [458] Nähe of the Savior. It justifies and regenerates at the same time; faith and love coincide; more than objective justification, the dynamic communication of the Spirit, the birth from Jesus' side, is of value. Born from Him, believers live without pietistic scrupulosity in his nearness, do everything in his name, place everything, also domestic and social life, under his regiment, and lead a cheerful, Christian life, cf. Plitt, Zinzendorfs Theol. I 301-453 II 242-420 III 45-215. Spangenberg, Idea fidei fratrum 1778. Becker in Herzog2 17, 513.
Ritschl, Gesch. d. Pietismus III 1886. What pietism was for the Lutheran, later the Methodism of Wesley 1703-1791 and Whitefield 1714-1771 became for the Reformed church. It originally wanted nothing else than to shake the sleeping church awake and to animate orthodox Christendom with a new life. To that end, first of all, by a gripping preaching of righteousness, sin, judgment, damnation, people had to be brought suddenly to a deep awareness of their lost condition; then in the same moment, without delay, be led by faith to Christ and assured of their salvation; and thereafter be urged to a new life, active in the service of the kingdom of God, devoting itself to mission and philanthropy, abstaining from all kinds of indifferent things, a sinless life. Methodism betrays, in distinction from pietism, clearly its English origin and Reformed descent. It is indeed just as much a reaction against dead orthodoxy; but it wants to know nothing of preparation, of no gradual progress of conversion; it has no prolonged
Busskampf, no finally entering Durchbruch, no later following Versiegelung; it draws everything together into one point, places conversion in the full light of consciousness, and keeps record of the saved souls. And when it has converted people, it does not gather them in quiet, withdrawn circles, in societies and conventicles, in order there to cultivate piety; but it
organizes them into an army, which proceeds in an offensive manner, full of fire enters the wide world and conquers it by storm for Christ, cf. Schaff,
Creeds I 882 III 807. Schoell in Herzog2 9, 681. Schneckenburger, Vorl. über die Lehrbegriffe der kleineren prot. Kirchenparteien 1863 d. 103-151.
Lecky, Entstehungsgesch. u. Charakt. der Methodismus, aus d. Engl. [459] Leipzig 1880. Kolde, Der Methodismus und seine Bekämpfung, Erl. 1886.
Id. Die Heilsarmee, Erl. 1885.
10. Also in more recent theology the descriptions of the order of salvation diverge widely. Kant, through his doctrine of radical Böse, came to the recognition that in man a neue Schöpfung had to take place, Religion ed.
Rosenkranz 54. Nevertheless he sees in conversion a work of man; concludes, just like Pelagius with his si debet, potest, from the du sollst to the du kannst; and exhorts everyone to do what is in his power to become a better man and then further to hope for höhere Mitwirkung, ib. 58. 59. Even if it is now the case that that conversion remains imperfect on earth, God counts the disposition for the deed and justifies us out of grace. Also, after his conversion man still always atones for the sins that he formerly committed, voluntarily takes the sorrow and punishment for them upon himself, and thus also makes himself worthy of forgiveness, ib. 82. 86 f.
Even more strongly than by Kant was the corruption of human nature taught by Schopenhauer; he too therefore said that, in order to improve man radically, illumination of the head, development of the intellect was wholly insufficient, that there had to take place a rebirth of the core of his being, because operari sequitur esse, Die Welt I6 477 f. II6 692 f. But he himself again deviates from this line of his thoughts and seeks deliverance from suffering partly in art and philosophy but especially in this, that man in the light of knowledge lets the whole wretched life work as a quietive for the
will, den will verneine and thus enter into the nirwana, where the will is completely extinguished, ib. I 448 f. In this Schopenhauer agreed with Schelling, whose negative philosophy ended with that, that blessedness is attainable, not along the path of virtue and the keeping of the law, but only in the way of the "beschauliche" life, Werke I 8 S. 235 f. II 1 S. 554 f., but who nevertheless in his positive philosophy expressed that man becomes partaker of justification and blessedness only through religion, through communion with the risen Christ, denn Person sucht Person, ib. 566 f. II 4
S. 217 f. And thus also von Hartmann seeks blessedness not in art, philosophy, religion but in the decision once to be taken by humanity, to destroy willing, in the Universalwillensverneinung, Philos. d. Unb. II9 400 f. With Hegel reconciliation is a process in the Divine being itself. Man is essentially one with God, but he does not know it. Being and consciousness are divided, man is to himself a stranger. But Christ was the first who became conscious of his Divine being, his being-one with God. And whoever, like Christ, in his communion, sees and acknowledges that unity, he is reconciled. What matters here is the disposition; the deed still for a long time lags behind that disposition but this imperfection is a vanishing moment and therefore does not count at all in reconciliation, Philos. d. Rel.,
Werke XII 266 f. In accordance with this philosophy of Hegel the theology of the moderns teaches that God and man, grace and will in the work of conversion form no antithesis, but that conversion at the same time and wholly is an act of both. Grace namely in fact coincides with the providence of God, works only ethically and pedagogically, itself cultivates and strengthens in the religious community the receptivity for salvation
(facultas se applicandi ad gratiam). In the long run it will then also bring all men to salvation and overcome all resistance. Man also in the proper sense
has no need of rebirth; only can conversion be so called, if it is considered from God's side. That conversion itself consists in repentance, i.e. remorse over past sins, disposition to bear the punishment for them willingly and henceforth to improve life, and in faith, i.e. trust in the grace of God in Christ. If man thus converts himself, then he is therein also immediately justified. Justification namely is no transcendent act of God but nothing other than the removal of the consciousness of guilt, change in the consciousness of the relation to God, abolition of the discord between the natural I and its destination. For in conversion man is initially renewed and as such bears the guarantee of perfection in himself, just as in the seed the plant is hidden and in the child the man. Cf. Strauss, Chr. Gl. II 362 f. 463.
492-497. Biedermann, Chr. Dogm. § 847-911. Schweizer, Chr. Gl. § 138164. Lang, Versuch einer chr. Dogm. § 19-25. Pfleiderer, Grundriss § 170.
Scholten, L. H. K. II 76v. 109v. Initia c. 5. [461] More in appearance than in reality does the representation which Schleiermacher gives of this order of salvation differ from this. After Christ, so he says, has entered into our fellowship of sin and misery, He has the power and the calling to receive us into His fellowship of holiness and blessedness. That takes place through regeneration and sanctification.
Regeneration consists in conversion and justification, which both are one and the same, viewed at one time from our side, at another time from God's side. In conversion, which again has two parts: repentance and faith, man is not cooperating and also not wholly passive but receptive (in the sense of Melanchthon's facultas se applicandi ad gratiam), so that then also the whole of humanity once becomes ripe for grace and partakes of salvation.
Justification is that act of God by which man is placed in fellowship with Christ; it consists negatively in forgiveness, i.e. condemnation of the old,
and positively in adoption, i.e. awakening of a new life; and, as the reverse side of conversion, leaves forgiveness in fact separated, because and insofar as man in the fellowship of Christ partakes of a new life. The Vermittelungstheologen have indeed assigned a broader place in dogmatics to the person of Christ and to the activity of the H. Spirit; but in the order of salvation they nevertheless have not wholly gone beyond Schleiermacher's thoughts. In the first place, almost all of them ascribe to man the power to accept or to reject grace, whether that power is derived from the creation or providence of God, or from the gratia praeparans bestowed in baptism or calling, cf. part II 343. And in the second place, they do correct
Schleiermacher insofar as they hold justification to be an objective act of God, but they nevertheless all let it take place on the ground, not of the imputed but of the infused righteousness of Christ, so that they teach not only a judicial but also a communicating, sanctifying act of God and a προληψις of the future, cf. e.g. Neander, Gesch. der Pflanzung u. Leitung der chr. K.5 551 f. Nitzsch, Syst. d. chr. Lehre § 146. 147. Martensen, Chr.
Dogm. § 230. 231. Lange, Chr. Dogm. II § 95. Ebrard, Dogm. § 443.
Schöberlein, Prinzip u. Syst. d. Dogm. 652 etc.; also Beck, Chr. Lehrwiss. I 522 f. 533 f. Chr. Glaub. II 595 f., cf. Die Rechtfertigungslehre der Prof. d.
Theol. Joh. Tob. Beck, O. F. Myrberg [462] und A. W. Ingman, geprüft u. beleuchtet von mehreren evang. Theologen u. von E. T. Gestrin, Berlin
1892; and even Hengstenberg in the Ev. Kirchenz. of 1866 and 1867, who for his opinion appealed to the epistle of James and also to Luk. 7:36v., cf.
Bew. d. Gl. 1868 S. 381 f. Ritschl, Rechtf. u. Vers. I2 644 f.
Over against this justification built on the subject, Ritschl returned again to the person of Christ and sought in his work the ground of forgiveness. To be sure, not in the sense that it had been acquired by Christ and consisted in
a change of God's disposition, for God is eternal love and punitive justice is not found with Him. But Christ, through his perfect fidelity to his calling, through his uninterrupted communion with God, through his complete surrender to God's will, nevertheless proclaimed and proved that God is love, that He does not wrath or punish but forgives. This now was necessary, not because God is far from humanity, but because humanity, through its sin, which is properly ignorance, no objective guilt but subjective consciousness of guilt, is far from God. Therefore Christ, even unto death, proclaimed God's love and, making God's purpose with humanity his own, founded a kingdom of God, a community, in which he transplanted that consciousness that God is love and forgives sin, and that it, without its sin needing to hinder it, can live in communion with God.
Justification is therefore with Ritschl a synthetic judgment, not pronounced on the ground of good works but preceding those good works; for first in man the fear of God as the judge must give place to the consciousness of his communion, before he can do good works and fulfil his moral calling.
Further, that justification is also no pronouncement about, no experience of, the individual believer, but it is a good of the community, which knows itself, in spite of its sin, to stand in communion with God; it coincides with the founding of the community itself, Rechtf. u. Vers.2 III 26-131. Kaftan,
Dogm. 493 f. Schultz, Grundriss der ev. Dogm. § 52. The particular persons become partakers of this benefit of justification only by joining the community and appropriating it to themselves in faith. That faith is free,
Rechtf. u. Vers. III 536; election also has not individual human beings but [463] the community as its object, ib. III 114. That faith is also not worked magically, but education is the ordinary form in which someone comes to faith, III 555. It consists essentially in trust, is independent of historical
investigation and its results, and rests on a deep impression that is made by the moral greatness of Jesus on the unprejudiced mind, cf. deel I 453.
Through that faith man receives another judgment about God, himself, the world; he learns to know God as love, knows that his sin is no longer any hindrance for communion with God, regards disasters and misfortunes no longer as punishments but rules spiritually over all things; in one word, his consciousness of guilt is taken away and therein consists his justification,
Rechtf. u. Vers. III 38 f. Consequence of this justification is reconciliation, the laying aside of enmity toward God on the ground of that justification, ib. III 74-76. And with that justification and reconciliation regeneration is essentially identical, for this does not consist in a hyperphysical change, but in a change of mood and disposition, ib. III 557. 562.
11. By the order of salvation, ordo or via salutis, is to be understood the manner in which, or the way along which, the sinner comes into possession of the benefits of grace, which have been acquired by Christ. In dogmatics it only late received an independent place and a somewhat regulated treatment. Among the scholastics the material for this locus is still scattered; the principal thing that here comes under discussion is to be found in the commentaries on Sent. II dist. 26-29, III dist. 25-27 and Summa II 1 qu.
109-114. The Tridentinum treats all the subjects relating to grace under the title de justificatione, sess. VI. The Roman theologians usually summarize the material in a locus de gratia and bring up therein successively the gratia actualis (natura, necessitas, gratuitas; sufficientia, efficacia etc.), the gratia habitualis (justincatio) and the fructus gratiae (meritum). The Reformation was the cause that this locus was treated much more broadly than formerly; it itself at first indeed spoke therein only of the poenitentia, the fide and the bonis operibus, but gradually expanded the number of subjects and treated
successively the vocatione, the illuminatione, the regeneratione, the conversione, the fide, [464] the justificatione etc. Naturally there was then soon felt the need to bring this extensive, rich material together again under one head. Calvin already led the way in this and gave to the third book of his Institutie the title: de modo percipiendae Christi gratiae, et qui inde fructus nobis proveniant et qui effectus consequantur. Others speak of the gratia Sp.
S. applicatrix (Quenstedt), σωτηριοποιια seu salutis consequendae modus (Calovius), redemptionis applicatio (Mastricht), ordo salutis seu salutis impetrandae modus (Reinhard) etc. This order of salvation now has to struggle with a peculiar difficulty. For on the one hand everything has been accomplished by Christ, sin reconciled, the law fulfilled, death overcome, Satan subdued, forgiveness acquired, life in incorruptibility brought to light. One would expect that they for whom
Christ has died would at once and completely be delivered from sin, suffering, death and would become partakers of holiness and blessedness.
This, however, is not the case; on the contrary they are in time admonished to faith and repentance, must be born again, justified, sanctified and glorified, remain in this life subject to sin, suffering and death and only through many tribulations enter into the kingdom of heaven. How is the one to be reconciled with the other? On the one hand everything accomplished, so that for man nothing remains to be done; and on the other hand it seems that to man still the principal thing must yet happen, if he is to become partaker of the acquired salvation. The Christian religion seems to adopt two irreconcilable standpoints, the heteroand the autosoteric, as it ascribes the acquisition of salvation wholly to Christ and yet exhorts us to work out our salvation with fear and trembling, cf. v.
Hartmann, Religionsphilosophie I 569 f. Two rocks there are therefore, on which the
Christian order of salvation always ran the danger of being wrecked, on antinomianism on the one and on pelagianism on the other side.
Pelagianism not only conflicts with the decrees of God, part II 349-357, but it also does injustice to the person and the work of Christ. In proportion as it extends human activity in the acquisition of salvation, it contracts that of Christ. For it is clear that, if faith, conversion, perseverance, stand wholly or in part in man's power and are his work, if the [465] decision concerning actually becoming saved in the end, when it comes down to it, lies in the hands of man, then Christ at most can only have acquired the possibility of becoming saved. He has then indeed opened the opportunity, but whether someone or few or many or all will make use of that opportunity and continue to make use of it, depends in the end on the people themselves.
God left them free and placed the decision in their hands. Then it follows that Christ in fact has by no means accomplished everything, but that the principal thing, i.e. that which decides about actually becoming saved, still must be done by man. Christ thus descends from the only place which He occupies in the work of salvation; He comes to stand on one line with all those prophets and teachers through whom God has instructed and educated men; his work becomes akin to and inserted into all those preparatory and pedagogical activities which God has expended upon the human race; the gospel of grace is only gradually distinguished from the lex naturae. And man himself, though helped and supported by all that educating labor of God, is called to self-activity. It depends on him whether he will seize the opportunities that God offers him and thus will become a partaker of salvation. The Pelagian representation of the order of salvation wipes out the specific distinction between Christianity and the heathen religions, comprehends them all together in one process, and can at most honor the
Christian religion as the first among its equals. It falls back into paganism and has salvation acquired by man's own wisdom and power. And thereby it also undermines the certainty of faith. Of the Heathen Paul testifies that they are without Christ and therefore also without God and without hope in the world, Ef. 2:12. From the works of the law there is no justification, there is also no certainty of salvation; in proportion as someone more precisely examines himself and his good works, he comes to the sad discovery that even his best works are imperfect and stained with sin; he must therefore content himself either with an appeal to God's love, which overlooks what is lacking and takes the will for the deed, or with an authority of church and priest, and surrender himself to a false reassurance; certainty he never has and [466] never gets for himself. Indeed, because grace, insofar as bestowed on him and necessary, remains not only resistible but also always amissible, he is at every moment exposed to the danger of again losing what he has and falling away from the hope of salvation. On this standpoint no fixed course, no development of the Christian life is possible. It is even wholly uncertain what the result of world history will be, whether there will come a church, a kingdom of God; the government of the world rests for the principal part, that is, for the eternal final destiny, in the hands of man. The errors of this rationalistic Pelagianism clearly leap to the eye; but they are also present where it wraps itself in pietistic or methodistic garb. Pietism and Methodism were, like so many other attempts at reformation of life in Protestant churches, in their right over against dead orthodoxy. They originally intended nothing else than to shake awake sleeping Christendom, wished to introduce no change in the confession of the Reformation but only to apply this in life. But out of understandable reaction they have in this their striving often gone too far and swung over to
another extreme. They too have gradually shifted the center of gravity from the objective to the subjective work of salvation. Thereby it is then in the essence of the matter indifferent whether one makes salvation dependent on faith and obedience or on faith and experience. In both cases man himself comes to the foreground. Even if pietism and methodism did not deny the acquisition of salvation by Christ, it nevertheless left this standing unused and brought it into no organic connection with the application. It was, so to speak, dead capital. The official activity of the exalted Christ, the Lord from heaven, receded into the shadow behind the experiences and feelings of the subject. In pietism man was referred, instead of to Christ, to himself; he had to traverse a long road, satisfy all kinds of demands and conditions, test himself by many and manifold marks, before he might believe, appropriate
Christ to himself, and be assured of his salvation. Methodism attempted to draw all this, conversion, faith, assurance, together into one indivisible moment, but it systematized this method, though very much shortened, in [467] the same way as pietism. In both there is a failure to recognize the activity of the H. Spirit, of the preparation of grace, of the connection of creation and re-creation. And therefore in neither does it come to a true
Christian life. Whether this pietistically withdraws from the world or after a methodistic fashion acts aggressively in the world, it is always something separate, something that stands dualistically alongside natural life, and that therefore does not work organically in family and society and state, in science and art. With or without the uniform of the army of salvation,
Christians are a special kind of people, who live not in but outside the world. The Reformation antithesis of sin and grace has more or less made room for the Roman antithesis of natural and supernatural. Puritanism has
been exchanged for asceticism. The essence of sanctification lies in abstinence from indifferent things.
On the other hand stands antinomianism. Over against Pelagianism it defends an important truth, which we, precisely in order to overcome antinomianism, must acknowledge not by halves but wholly and completely. It is true that Christ has accomplished everything and that man has nothing to add to his offering unto salvation, nor can he contribute anything at all. But antinomianism (not to be confused with properly antineonomianism in England and in this country) makes use of this truth only in order to give entrance to a wholly different doctrine. For most certainly, Christ has accomplished everything. But does that mean that not we, but that also Christ has nothing more to do, after He has suffered and died? Indeed no, for Christ has also been raised and glorified, He has through and after His resurrection been appointed Son of God in power,
Lord from heaven, life-giving Spirit. For Christ there remains in the state of exaltation still much to do; He must also apply and distribute to His church the salvation which He acquired, and to that end has sent out His Spirit, in order that He might regenerate the whole church and lead it into all truth.
Antinomianism now fails to recognize this application of the work of salvation; it denies in principle the personality and activity of the H. Spirit.
At bottom, according to the law that two extremes touch one another, it agrees with [468] Pelagianism. But precisely because it is inwardly driven by another interest than that of the perfect offering of Christ, it proceeds still further and also denies and combats objective satisfaction. Christ namely by His suffering and dying has not acquired eternal salvation, but He has only made known God's love; reconciliation and justification are from eternity already. Just as in Pelagianism, Christ here descends to the
rank of a prophet and teacher. But while Pelagianism comes to these errors through its deistic principle, antinomianism arises in principle out of pantheism. It resembles as two drops of water the philosophy of Gnosticism, of Spinoza and Hegel. God is essentially one with man; He is from all eternity reconciled; wrath and righteousness are human conceptions. Only man feels himself, through his finitude and limitation, far from God; he thinks that God is far from him, that He is wrathful over sin and demands satisfaction. And that is an erroneous thought which man forms of God. God is eternal love, eternally reconciled, eternally one with man. And the whole redemption therefore consists in this, that man by means of the preaching of the prophets be better informed and enlightened, that he lay aside the delusion of the wrath and the punishment-demanding righteousness of God, that he acknowledge God as his Father, himself as His child. For redemption nothing else is necessary than this enlightenment; in that it consists; it comprises nothing else than faith. There is no conversion, no repentance, no sorrow over sins, no fear of hell, no fear of judgment, no prayer for forgiveness, no sanctification, no good works needed; those are all Pelagian errors, which do injustice to the objective facts of God's grace and reconciliation. On a low, legalistic standpoint one still feels need of that, just as one then still lets satisfaction come about through Christ's offering and speaks of God's wrath and righteousness. But those are religious conceptions, symbolic dressings, which for the common people have their value, but which on the standpoint of the πνευματικοι, of the philosophers, make way for the pure idea and the adequate concept. Just as Pelagianism, so also antinomianism ends with total failure to recognize the essence of Christianity, sinks back to paganism and places [469] the redemption from sin in rationalistic enlightenment or moralistic
improvement of man. Both deny, in Arian or in Sabellian form, the confession of the Trinity.
12. Only on the foundation of the trinitarian confession is there room for an order of salvation in a scriptural, Christian, Reformed sense. From that confession there follows, in the first place, that the application of salvation is distinct from its acquisition. For the Holy Spirit is indeed in essence one with, but nevertheless as person another than, the Father and the Son. He has a proper mode of existence, a proper order of working. Even though all the works of God outwardly are undivided and unseparated, there is nevertheless in creation and re-creation an economy to be observed, which gives us the right to speak of the Father and our creation, of the Son and our redemption, of the Spirit and our sanctification. Why could Christ testify that the H. Spirit was not yet, because He was not yet glorified, and why did the H. Spirit have to be poured out on the day of Pentecost, if sanctification were not a work distinct from creation and redemption, as the Spirit is distinct from Father and Son? The work that had been entrusted to the Mediator was therefore not ended with his suffering and dying. Christ is not in that sense a historical person as others, that He, after having lived and laboured on earth for a time, now still works only through his spirit and exercises influence through his word and example. Although He on earth accomplished all the work that the Father had commissioned Him to do, in heaven He continues his prophetic, priestly, and kingly activity. For that purpose He has precisely been raised and glorified at God's right hand. He is the living Lord from heaven. That activity is another than that which He performed on earth, even though it also stands in the closest connection with it. Through his earthly offering He has accomplished everything that there was to do in the sphere of justice; He has satisfied God's demand,
fulfilled the law, acquired all benefits of grace. That work is finished and is susceptible of no increase or decrease; there is nothing to add to it and nothing to take from it; it is perfect. The Father rests in it and has sealed it with the raising of his Son. All benefits that God grants in the [470] covenant of grace, He grants per et propter Christum. But there is a distinction between ownership and possession. Just as a child, even before his birth, already has a right to all the goods of his father but only at a much later age comes into possession of them, so also all who will later believe have, long before their faith, a right of ownership in Christ to all the benefits that He has acquired; but they enter into possession of them only through faith. The acquisition of salvation thus requires its application; it includes it and brings it forth. Just as the exaltation of Christ stands in connection with his humiliation, just as his activity in heaven with that on earth, so the application of salvation stands in connection with its acquisition. And that application is twofold. The redemption through Christ is, after all, a redemption from sin and all its consequences. He not only took over from us guilt and punishment, but also fulfilled the law in our place. The application of the benefits of Christ must correspondingly consist in justification, i.e. in the assurance of the forgiveness of sins and the right to eternal life, but also in sanctification, i.e. the renewal after the image of Christ. Not only the guilt, also the stain and the power of sin must be taken away. It must be a complete redemption, an entire re-creation. In order to work this out and bring it to pass on the ground of his accomplished offering, for that purpose Christ is exalted at the Father's right hand. For that purpose He has sent out the H. Spirit, who not only testifies with our spirit that we are children of God, but who also regenerates us and re-creates us after the image of God. This work of
application is therefore a divine work, just as much as the creation of the Father and the redemption of the Son; and the Holy Spirit, who brings it to pass, is therefore, with the Father and the Son, one only God, to be praised and extolled unto eternity.
In the second place, the confession of the Trinity implies that the work of sanctification, in the economic sense entrusted to the Holy Spirit, though distinguished, is nevertheless not for a moment separated from the work of redemption and of creation, which are carried out by the Son and the Father.
This is already evident from the fact that the Spirit in the Divine being proceeds from the Father and the Son and with them partakes of the same essence. And as He exists, so He works, in creation and also in [471] recreation. From this it follows first of all that the work of the Spirit is connected with and harmonizes with the work of the Father. There is between the two no opposition and no contradiction. It is not so that the Father wills the salvation of all and the Holy Spirit applies it only to a few, or conversely, but both work together, because they are one in essence. It also follows from this that nature and grace, however distinct, do not exclude one another. The Roman Catholic system of doctrine is wholly and entirely governed by the opposition of nature and supernatural grace; and various Protestant directions and sects have fallen back into that error; pietism and Methodism fail to recognize the right and the value of nature both before and after conversion. But the Reformation in principle knew no other opposition than that of sin and grace. Nature too was a creation of God and stood under his providence; it is in itself of no lesser value than grace. And therefore it could ascribe to nature, i.e. to the guidance of God in natural life both among the peoples and among particular persons, a pedagogical significance. It is God himself who already prepares the
gracious working of the Holy Spirit in the generations, and the Holy Spirit in his activity joins himself to the guidances of God in natural life and seeks by his grace to restore the whole natural life, to deliver it from the power of sin and to consecrate it to God. But from the unity of essence of Father,
Son, and Spirit it also follows that the Holy Spirit is connected with the work of the Son. Son and Spirit also do not work against one another, so that the Spirit, e.g., would apply salvation to a few, while the Son would nevertheless have acquired it for all, or conversely. One in essence, they work together with one another in their distinct activity. For through his humiliation the Son himself has become a life-giving Spirit. He lives wholly and entirely by the Spirit. What He has died, that He has once died to sin; what He now lives, He lives to God. He has become fully partaker of immortality, of eternal, spiritual life. There is nothing natural, psychical any longer in Him that can suffer and die. He has, through the Spirit already on earth made fit for his work and anointed with Him without measure, fully acquired that Spirit, received all gifts of that Spirit, lives, rules, and governs now through that Spirit. The [472] Spirit of the Father and of the Son has become his Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. Thus He was not yet, before Christ was glorified. But now he is the Spirit of Christ, his property, his possession. And therefore He sends that Spirit on the day of Pentecost, in order through Him to apply all his benefits to his church. The Holy Spirit does not acquire those benefits, He adds not a single one to them, for Christ has accomplished everything. He is in no respect the meritorious cause of our salvation; this is Christ alone, in whom the fullness of the Godhead dwells bodily, and whose work therefore does not need to be supplemented or improved. The Holy Spirit, on the contrary, takes everything from Christ; just as the Son came to glorify the Father, so the Holy Spirit in his turn has
descended, to glorify the Son. Of that Son He testifies, out of his fullness He imparts grace for grace, to that Son He leads, and through the Son to the Father. And all benefits of Christ He applies, to each in his measure, in his time, according to his order. And He does not end his activity before He has caused the fullness of Christ to dwell in his church, and this has become a perfect man and has come to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Therefore the activity of the Holy Spirit is nothing other than an applying one; the order of salvation an applicatio salutis. The question in that connection is by no means: what does man have to do, in order to become partaker of salvation, but only: what does God do in his grace, in order to make the church partaker of the perfect salvation acquired by Christ. The applicatio salutis too is a work of God, which ought to be regarded theologically, not anthropologically.
Against this conception of the order of salvation, however, from the side of Pelagianism the objection is always raised, that in this way the right of man is denied, his self-activity suppressed, and a godless life promoted.
Insofar as this objection would in principle wish to overthrow the testimony of Scripture, that by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified, it is not acceptable from a Christian standpoint; whoever would wish to meet it would at that same moment and to that same extent leave the ground of Scripture. Insofar as it is really an objection and deserves consideration, it is untrue and rests on misunderstanding. For the conception of the [473] applicatio salutis as the work of God does not exclude, but includes the full recognition of all those moral factors which, under the guidance of God's providence, act upon the understanding and heart of the unconverted man.
Insufficient may they be unto salvation, as Scripture and experience clearly declare; but of any denial of their value, even for the work of grace, there is
from a purely Reformed standpoint no question; for it is God himself, indeed, who thus leads his children of men, bears witness to them, and does good from heaven over them, whether they might seek Him and find Him.
Further, it is not to be seen why the Holy Spirit, calling through the Word to faith and conversion, can nullify that moral working of the Word upon heart and conscience which Pelagianism ascribes to it. The Reformed doctrine holds no less, it only includes more, than is acknowledged by Pelagius and his followers. These think to be able to suffice with that moral working;
Augustine, however, and his fellow-combatants judged it insufficient but nevertheless fully took it up into the working of grace of the Holy Spirit.
Further, the application of salvation is and remains always a work of the Spirit, a work of the Holy Spirit, of the Spirit of Christ, and therefore never coercive and violent, but always spiritual, lovely and gentle, not treating man as a stick or block, but as a rational being, enlightening, convincing, drawing, bending; causing his darkness to yield to light and replacing his spiritual powerlessness with spiritual power. Grace and sin form an antithesis; the latter is overcome only by the power of the former; but as soon and in the same measure as the power of sin is broken, the antithesis between God and man falls away. It is God's Spirit who bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. I live, yet no longer I, but Christ lives in me, and what I live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God. It is
God who works in us both the willing and the working according to his good pleasure, and who himself causes us to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. So far is it from being the case that this theological conception would cultivate a godless life, that it alone guarantees the reality of a new, Christian life, assures believers of the certainty of their salvation, infallibly promises the triumph of the [474] kingdom of God, and causes the
work of the Father and of the Son, in the work of God the Holy Spirit, to attain completion. Pelagianism makes everything shaky and unstable, even the triumph of the good and the triumph of the kingdom of God, because it suspends everything upon the incalculable arbitrariness of man. Coming forward for the rights of man, it tramples the rights of God underfoot and leaves for man only the right of arbitrariness. But the Reformation, coming forward for the rights of God, has therein also again brought the right of man to recognition; for here too the word of Scripture holds: those who honour Me, I will honour, but those who despise Me shall be lightly esteemed. The theological conception of the order of salvation takes up into itself all the good that lies hidden in the anthropological; but the reverse does not take place. God encompasses man, but whoever begins with man excludes God.
13. All the benefits of the covenant, which Christ acquired and the H.
Spirit applies, can be summarized under the name of grace. Of grace, however, one can speak in different senses. In the first place it can denote the unmerited favor of God toward his creatures, especially toward sinners; as such it is discussed in the doctrine of God's attributes, part II 182. Next it can be the name for all kinds of bodily and spiritual benefits, which are bestowed by God out of grace upon his creatures and are all gifts of grace, indeed are grace itself, Rom. 5:20, Ef. 1:7, 2:5, 8, Phil. 1:2, Col. 1:2, Tit. 3:7 etc. Furthermore, grace can make known the agreeableness which someone displays through the gifts with which he is adorned in soul or body. And finally χαρις and gratia also have the meaning of thanks, shown by someone to another for received favor (gratias agere). Here we have to do only with grace in the second sense. But even so the concept is still far too broad. For in this locus there are not discussed the objective benefits of grace, which
God has given to human beings in his law, in the gospel, in Christ, church, sacrament etc., and which elsewhere are treated separately in dogmatics.
Here in this place belong only those gifts of grace, which are communicated by the H. Spirit subjectively and [475] inwardly to the human being and which stand in connection with his salvation. These gifts of grace are again to be distinguished into gifts of God's general grace, which are bestowed upon all and various human beings in greater or lesser measure; into gifts of God's special grace, which are only the portion of believers, and into extraordinary gifts (charismata), which the H. Spirit distributes in the congregation to each one, likewise as He wills, 1 Cor. 12:4-11. It is clear that especially the second group of gifts of grace in this section of dogmatics has a claim to treatment. Concerning this grace there exists between Rome and the Reformation, specifically in its Reformed development, an important difference. In the first place Rome indeed decidedly teaches the necessity of the gratia actualis (praeveniens, antecedens, excitans, also sometimes called operans) and thus rejects
Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism; it also does not understand by that grace the outward calling through the gospel alone with the moral effect on understanding and will connected with it; it thinks in that connection of an illustratio intellectus and inspiratio voluntatis, which adds to the human being not only vires morales but also vires physicas. But it conceives this grace at the beginning and in the progress as resistible and amissible; the decision whether the human being will accept that grace, will with it prepare himself for his justification, receive the grace of justification (gratia infusa) and will preserve it to the end, depends on himself. In the second place the nature of grace is described differently in Rome than in the Reformation. The Roman theologians do indeed expressly say that the
gratia actualis and infusa is not a substance but a quality, Heinrich, Dogm.
Theol. VIII 556 f. Pesch, Prael. dogm. V 174, but already of the gratia excitans it is said that it not moraliter but physice elevat facultates nostras, ut supernaturaliter agere possint, Pesch, Prael. dogm. V 19, and thus is entitative supernatural, totum ordinem naturalem transcendens, ib. 21. And still more strongly it is said of the gratia infusa that it is a gift of God, by which the human being in ordinem supernaturalem elevatur et naturae divinae aliquo modo particeps fit, ib. 172. 188. This is connected in the third place with the fact that the intention of grace in Rome is different than in the Reformation. It has there a twofold task, ut elevet et sanet. The first presses [476] the latter entirely into the shadow, munus elevandi est principale et gratiae convenit in omni ordine supernaturali. Munus antem sanandi est secundarium et gratiae accessit in ordine naturae lapsae; in the first sense it is absolutely, in the second only accidentally necessary, ib. 32.
33 and so all the writers cited above p. 441v. Grace in Rome is in the first place a quality added to the human being above the order of nature, by which he is in principle taken up into a supernatural order, becomes a partaker of the divine nature, holiness, sonship, the communion of God, the indwelling of the H. Spirit, the vision of God, and can perform such supernatural works, which ex condigno merit eternal life. The forgiveness of sins is here subordinate, faith has only a praeparatory value; the main thing is the elevation of the human being above his nature, deification, ἡ προς θεον αφομοιωσις τε και ἑνωσις, Dionysius in Heinrich, Dogm. Theol.
VIII 595, cf. also part II 152. 518.
The Reformation rejected this Neoplatonic mysticism, returned to the simplicity of Holy Scripture, and therefore obtained a wholly different conception of grace. This does not serve to take man up into a supernatural
order, but to deliver him from sin. Grace stands not over against nature, but only over against sin. In the proper sense it was not necessary for Adam before the fall, but has first become necessary through sin; it is therefore not absolutely, but only accidentally necessary. The physical antithesis of natural and supernatural gives way to the ethical one of sin and grace. When grace wholly takes away sin with its guilt and stain and punishment, then it has accomplished its work. Then man of himself is again the image of God, for the image of God is no donum superadditum but belongs to the essence of man. There is therefore no need, alongside the grace that delivers from sin, for any other grace that then still elevates man above his nature. Indeed, according to the Reformed, grace has bestowed upon us more back again than we have lost through Adam. For Christ acquired not only the posse non peccare and mori, as the Lutherans represent it, but He bestows upon believers at once the non posse peccare and mori; He does not bring us back to that point on the way where Adam stood, [477] but He has traversed the whole way for us to the end. He fulfilled not only passive but also active obedience; He acquired the inalienable blessedness, eternal life, which for Adam still lay in the future. Precisely because Adam's destination lay in eternal blessedness, Christ could acquire this in his place for us. But grace nevertheless gives nothing more than what, if Adam had remained standing, would have been acquired by him in the way of obedience. The covenant of grace differs from the covenant of works in the way, but not in the final goal. It is the same good that was promised in the covenant of works and is bestowed in the covenant of grace. Grace restores nature and leads it up to its highest height, but it adds to it no new, heterogeneous constituent. From this it follows that grace in Reformation theology cannot in any respect bear the character of a substance. The Reformation indeed confessed of grace
that it is not only external but also internal, that it bestows not only moral but also hyperphysical powers, that it is a quality, a habitus. But even if it sometimes expressed itself in the same words as Rome, it nevertheless attached to them a different sense. With Rome grace is a physical power, because it must elevate nature to the supernatural order; if it served only to deliver man from sin, then, with a view to the Roman doctrine of sin, a moral power of grace would probably be enough. But the Reformation thought otherwise about sin; this was guilt and at the same time a total corruption of human nature; man was by nature dead in sins and trespasses; his impotence can in a certain sense be called a natural one, above p. 150,
151. And therefore grace must also be such as enlightens the understanding and bends the will, which thus works not only morally but also hyperphysically and restores the powers. But with Rome this physical operation of grace is an antithesis to the ethical, in any case one far surpassing the ethical; with the Reformation it is and remains ethical. For natural impotence is in its nature a spiritual, moral impotence, an impotence unto good, caused solely and only by sin; it is called only natural, because it is "by nature," i.e. by virtue of the fallen, sinful nature, proper to man, not introduced into him by habit, upbringing [478] etc., and thus also cannot be removed by such moral powers. Grace works hyperphysically only because it removes that fallen-natural impotence and restores the original-natural capacity unto good. With Rome grace in the strict sense gives a physical power which the homo naturalis without the donum superadditum, even if he is completely sinless, does not possess and which must be bestowed upon him separately. It is physically impossible for that man to do supernatural good works, just as it is physically impossible for him to touch the stars with his hand. But the impotence in the Protestant confession is not
of that nature; and therefore grace here is also no physical quality in the Roman sense, even if it restores the original power unto good lost through sin. And since sin is no substance and has taken away from man nothing substantial, grace too can never be thought of as a substance. It is a restoration of the forma, which was originally impressed upon man and upon creatures in general at creation. Re-creation is no second, new creation. It adds no new creatures to what exists, it brings no new substance into it, but it is essentially reformation. But in that connection, intensively, the operation of grace extends just as far as the power of sin extends. Sin has affected everything, corrupted the whole organism of creation, the very nature of creatures; and therefore grace is a power of God which also inwardly, in the core of its being, delivers humanity from sin and one day sets it without spot or wrinkle before the face of God. Therefore a morally working grace is not enough. Rome seems to honor grace when it calls it absolutely necessary, and has it bestow physical powers that far surpass nature. But in the end it makes all that grace again so powerless that its operation depends on the will of man. It accomplishes nothing when the will resists it. And if the will consents to it, it serves only to bestow upon man the powers that are needed for meriting every following grace and eternal life. It is an aid for man unto his deification. But with the Reformation grace is the beginning, middle, and end of the whole work of salvation; nothing of the merit of man enters into it. As creation and redemption, so also sanctification is a work of God. Out of Him and through Him it is, and therefore it also leads to Him. To Him be the glory unto eternity. Cf. on the Reformed concept of grace: Zanchius, Op. II 342
VII 266. 354. Polanus, Synt. II c. 21. Martyr, Loci Comm. 248. Perkins, Werken I 799v. Twissus, Op. I 685 sq. Junius, de natura et gratia, Op. I 302-
305. Gomarus, de gratia conversionis, Op. I 85-126. Moor I 670. M.
Vitringa III 173 enz.
14. Under the general name of grace many particular benefits are included. Scripture is inexhaustible in enumerating the blessings which Christ has acquired. Theology at all times found itself at a loss to treat them fully and in an orderly arrangement. When the Reformation again placed the work of the H. Spirit in the foreground, it did indeed discuss this at first in the three loci de poenitentia, de fide et de bonis operibus, but it soon found itself compelled to a more extensive treatment. And not only was the number of loci expanded, but in their content and mutual relation there gradually arose, especially in Reformed theology, all sorts of important modification. Thus regeneration was at first conceived in a very broad sense, as the renewal of man, and thus treated after faith, Calv. Inst. III c. 2.
3. Beza, Tract. theol. I 671. Junius, Theses theol. 34, 1. Ned. Gel. art. 22, or also even taken for the whole re-creation, so that it also included justification or forgiveness, Form. Conc. bij Müller 611; but soon one saw, also with a view to the children of the covenant, whose baptism had to be defended over against anabaptism, that the gratia regenerationis prior in nobis est quam fides, quae illius est effectus, Polanus, Synt. p. 467, and thus came to limit regeneration to the infusion of the first principle of life and thus to let it precede faith. Concerning the time of that regeneration there was and remained great difference; while Roman Catholics and Lutherans let it take place in all children in baptism, the Reformed said that the grace of regeneration was bestowed upon the elect children of the covenant either already before or in or after or also without further determination before, in, or after baptism, Voetius, Disp. II 408 sq. Witsius, Misc. S. II 614. 627. M.
Vitringa [480] III 80, and that it was granted to those who were brought in
at a later age, in and after or also before the calling, Voetius, Disp. II 461.
From that there again flowed that regeneration in dogmatics came to stand not only before faith but also before the calling; an order which was defended with this, that verbum Dei nemo salutariter andire potest nisi qui sit regenitus, Maccovius, Loci C. p. 710-714. Coll. theol. p. 398. Theses theol. per loc. comm. 1641 p. 320. Voetius, Disp. II 445. Kuyper, Het werk v. d. H. Geest II 128v. A further consequence of this order was that the poenitentia, which with the Reformers preceded faith and was effected by the law, came to fall away almost entirely; moreover, Luther and Calvin had already made a distinction between the sorrow which proceeds from the law and can also occur in the unconverted, and that other which already presupposed faith and was a true sorrow over sin. The Reformed therefore, following the example of Calvin, Inst. III 3, 1. 2, included the poenitentia in the Christian life, and for that soon, because poenitentia, like penance, had acquired a Roman flavor and involuntarily made one think of punishment, began to use another word, viz. resipiscentia, Beza, Tract. theol. I 327 sq.
Musculus, Loci Comm. 1567 p. 550. This conversion thus received an entirely different sense. If regeneration as a rule preceded everything and in the children of the covenant took place in youth, then conversion did not always need, as pietism and methodism later demanded, to go together cum notabili concussione et violenta tractione, but it could take place assiduo, successive et suaviter; then it was also not necessary that someone clearly had knowledge of and could give an account of the manner and the time of his conversion, Voetius, Dis, II 415. 460, as e.g. Wesley knew that it took place 24 May 1738 in the evening at 8-3/4 o'clock. Then it was no longer concentrated on one point, but spread itself through the whole Christian life; then it also could no longer, as the poenitentia formerly, have as parts
the contritio and fides, but consisted in a continual dying of the old and rising of the new man, Ursinus in his explanation of Zond. 23. Beza ib.
Polanus, Synt. p. 468 etc. And finally, not to mention more and not to speak further here of the distinction of the calling into outward and inward, of faith into [481] habitus and actus—this modification was also introduced into the order of salvation, that justification was even placed before regeneration and calling. One came to that especially in the struggle against neonomism. Faith and conversion could and might after all not be legal conditions, to be fulfilled by man, in order to become partaker of forgiveness and thus to bring it about. They were, after all, gifts of the H.
Spirit, benefits of the covenant of grace, fruits of the work of Christ. But then there was also no communion in those benefits possible except after communion in the person of Christ. The imputation of his person with all his benefits thus preceded the bestowal of those benefits: justification received the first place in the order of salvation. Nevertheless this schema in Reformed dogmatics has only rarely been followed through to the end and fully applied; only a few, such as Maccovius, have the order: justificatio activa, regeneratio, fides, justificatio passiva, bona opera. The conditions which gradually entered into the church did not allow the application of the schema. With a pure state of the church it is possible to believe that the children of the covenant are regenerated in their youth and successive et suaviter come to faith and conversion. But when the world penetrates into the church and many grow up and live for years long without showing any fruit worthy of faith and conversion, then the earnest-minded see themselves called to warn against confidence in a regeneration in youth and the historical faith in the forgiveness of sins and to urge true conversion, saving faith, in order thus in truth to become partakers of the forgiveness of
sins. Over against a dead orthodoxy pietism and methodism with their revivals always again have a right to exist.
The order of salvation, however, has been changed by these two directions into a conversion history of the sinner, which served as a model for everyone without distinction. In doing so, weighty truths were disregarded and the order of salvation itself falsified. For it does not have to set forth how man must come to conversion and assurance; for in that way a law is imposed upon the H. Spirit, one method is chosen for all, and the anthropological standpoint is put in the place of the theological. [482] But the order of salvation has to indicate which the benefits are that Christ has acquired and applies through the H. Spirit, and in what order they lie in the Word and in the thought of God. Thus considered, there is now 1o no doubt that all benefits of Christ are benefits of the covenant of grace. That covenant has its foundation in eternity, it rests in the counsel and the good pleasure of God. Christ is mediator of that covenant and has therefore been able in time to make satisfaction vicariously for his own. There has been an imputation of Christ to his church and of the church to Christ, there has taken place between both an exchange, there has been established a unio mystica, which does not first come into being in time but is rooted in eternity. If one wishes to call all this justification, there is no other objection to that than that one uses the word in an unusual sense, deviates from the usage of speech of Scripture, treats one and the same matter twice under a different name (once as pactum salutis, then as justification), and in any case cannot remain faithful to one's point of departure. For even those who in the Geref. church teach an eternal justification have nevertheless never said that that substitution of Christ and his church in the pactum salutis was already the whole, full justification. But they have held it for the first
moment and expressly declared that it had to be continued and completed in the resurrection of Christ, in the gospel, in the calling, in the testimony of the H. Spirit through faith and from works and in the last judgment. None of them has therefore treated or disposed of justification in the locus on the counsel of God or the covenant of redemption; but all of them have brought it up in the order of salvation, and indeed not only before but also then again after faith as justificatio passiva. 2o Neither may there, from a Christian standpoint, be any doubt that all benefits of grace have been acquired by Christ, are present in him and lie ready for his church. There is nothing that needs to be added on the part of man; everything is accomplished. And because these benefits are all benefits of the covenant, have been acquired in the way of the covenant and are distributed in that same way, therefore there is no participation in those benefits except through participation in his person. The covenant, the unio mystica, the [483] imputation of Christ precedes; how otherwise could we receive the H.
Spirit, the grace of regeneration, the gift of faith, which after all are all acquired by Christ and are his property? It is therefore not so that we are first regenerated by the H. Spirit apart from Christ and receive faith, in order then with that to go to Christ, accept his righteousness and thus be justified by God. But from the good pleasure of the Father, from the fullness of Christ, from the covenant of grace, these benefits too flow to us.
If one now wishes to call this imputation of the person of Christ, which precedes the bestowal of his benefits, thus also of regeneration and faith, justification, then in the main the same objections are to be raised against it that have been mentioned above. But then one moreover forgets that this imputation of Christ is not identical with justification or forgiveness; that all benefits, also regeneration, faith, sanctification etc., just as much as the
forgiveness of sins, lie objectively ready in Christ and thus as such no order is to be derived from them; and that the justificatio passiva through and from faith is an action of God, a testimony of the H. Spirit in and with our spirit, which is not temporally to be separated from the justificatio activa.
3o The way in which these benefits, to be more closely described presently, come into the possession of believers, is that of calling through Word and through Spirit. By that God brought creation into being, by that he also brings re-creation into being. Many have placed this calling after regeneration. And without doubt it precedes this benefit of calling in all children of the covenant who are regenerated in their youth. Yet making these cases into a general rule is just as dangerous as the opposite. For in the first place there has always been difference and freedom of opinion among the Geref. about the time of regeneration, before or under or after baptism. Scripture does not speak clearly enough to make a decision in this.
In the second place it is in many cases very difficult to assume that people who have been regenerated in their youth live for years in all kinds of sins and only afterwards come to conversion, cf. also Voetius, Disp. II 410;
Scripture gives not a single proof for this. In the third place it is not permissible, in the field of mission, already to presuppose regeneration with the calling through the [484] gospel, because Word and Spirit are thereby separated in a questionable way. In the fourth place the order of existence in the persons in the Divine being and the order of their works in creation and re-creation indicate that the Word preceded the Spirit, Christmas day and Easter festival preceded Pentecost; the H. Spirit is the witness of Christ.
And finally the calling is to be conceived much more broadly than can happen when it is placed after regeneration. There is a vocatio universalis, a vocatio generalis, a vocatio specialis. The calling in general absolutely does
not intend only to bring the regenerated to faith and conversion, but has significance for all people. It is by no means only outward but also inward and is already understood early by children. That the deaf cannot hear in that case is absolutely no objection, because God himself is the one calling, and, just as he in creation called everything into appearance out of nothing by his word, so in re-creation he calls the things that are not as though they were. 4o The benefits themselves, which through the calling become the portion of believers, fall apart into two groups. Sin is guilt and stain, breach of the covenant of works and loss of the image of God. Christ satisfied by his passive and active obedience. And thus the benefits of Christ consist in this, that he restores us in our relation to God and all creatures (justification, adoption to children, Christian freedom), and further renews us according to God's image (regeneration in a broader sense, sanctification, perseverance).
The first series of benefits is bestowed upon us through the illumination of the H. Spirit, is received by us in faith as cognitio, assensus, certitudo, and transforms our consciousness. The second group of benefits becomes our portion through the regenerating activity of the H. Spirit, in faith as fiducia cordis, and changes our being. With the first our eye is directed to the past, to the historical Christ, to the cross and to the gospel that testifies of it; with the second our gaze is lifted upward, to the living Lord in heaven, the king of the church, the bridegroom of the congregation. Distinguished they are, separated they are not. It is Christ himself, the glorified Savior, who through his Word and Spirit directs our faith to his sacrifice and takes our persons up into his communion. It is [485] one and the same faith by which he assures us in our consciousness and renews us in our being, justifies us and dwells in our hearts. 5o Correspondingly, the order of salvation is to be treated in three loci: calling and regeneration (in the narrower sense), faith
and justification, sanctification and perseverance, cf. Voetius, Disp. II 432 sq. In the first locus Christ appears chiefly as prophet, who by his word instructs us unto salvation; the H. Spirit is therewith the witness of Christ, who exercises his officium elencticum, and by the gratia praeparans, praeveniens and operans bestows upon us the principle of the new life. In the second Christ is chiefly the priest, who through faith bestows upon us his righteousness and delivers us from the guilt of sins; the H. Spirit therewith exercises his munus paracleticum and by the gratia illuminans makes us certain of our salvation. In the third Christ appears chiefly as our king, who governs and protects us through faith; the H. Spirit therewith accomplishes his munus sanctificans and re-creates us by the gratia cooperans, conservans, perficiens according to the image of Christ. In Rom.
8:30 Paul likewise names three benefits in which the προγνωσις realizes itself, namely calling, justification and glorification. All these benefits fall in time; also the ἐδοξασεν does not refer to the glorification after death or the day of judgment, but, as the aorist shows, to the glorification which the believers in Paul's days already received on earth through the indwelling of the Spirit, cf. 2 Cor. 3:18, and which is completed in the glorification at the resurrection on the last day, 1 Cor. 15:53, Phil. 3:21. They are all bestowed at the same time upon the elect in faith, cf. also 1 Cor. 6:11, but therefore there still exists among them a logical order; and this is presented in the ordo salutis, cf. Gennrich, Studien zur Paulin. Heilsordnung, Stud. u. Krit.
1898 S. 377-431.