When even Calvin gets it wrong...
What relationship do a Christians' good works have with their final judgement? Are they merely evidences of justification, or do they in any way contribute to justification? Surprisingly, Calvin regards good works as "inferior causes" of salvation:
Moreover, when Scripture intimates that the good works of believers are causes why the Lord does them good, we must still understand the meaning so as to hold unshaken what has previously been said—viz. that the efficient cause of our salvation is placed in the love of God the Father; the material cause in the obedience of the Son; the instrumental cause in the illumination of the Spirit, that is, in faith; and the final cause in the praise of the divine goodness. In this, however, there is nothing to prevent the Lord from embracing works as inferior causes. But how so? In this way: Those whom in mercy he has destined for the inheritance of eternal life, he, in his ordinary administration, introduces to the possession of it by means of good works. What precedes in the order of administration is called the cause of what follows. For this reason, he sometimes makes eternal life a consequent of works; not because it is to be ascribed to them, but because those whom he has elected he justifies, that he may at length glorify (Rom. 8:30); he makes the prior grace to be a kind of cause, because it is a kind of step to that which follows. But whenever the true cause is to be assigned, he enjoins us not to take refuge in works, but to keep our thoughts entirely fixed on the mercy of God...
– John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion III.xiv.21.
Notice that Calvin commits a logical fallacy here. He indicates that temporal succession implies a causal relation. This is what is known as the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. Just because good works always precede eternal life, it doesn't mean they cause it – rather, both the good works and the eternal life come from the same source: union with Christ.
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(Anonymous)
2007-10-15 03:09
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Your smart John!
--Luke
PS When we've finished moving we'll catch up.(Reply to this) (Thread) |
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(Anonymous)
2007-10-15 14:32
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Well, I guess it just goes to show that we'll all be proven wrong about some elements of our theology in the end. And I agree, union with Christ is key to understanding sanctification in general and good works in particular. (Reply to this) (Thread) |
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(Anonymous)
2007-10-15 17:01
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1) You still haven't told us what your answers to the infant baptist questions are... in fact has anyone?
2) I don't think he's got it wrong, necessarily. I think he's more or less agreeing with you, John. It's as if he's saying: In a sense, one thing necessarily follows from another. And so *in an inferior sense* we 'might' then say that it is a cause, loosely speaking ("a kind of cause" in second last line of quote).
Calvin is rightly picking up on the fact that Scripture itself sometimes uses this looser, 'post hoc ergo propter hoc' ogic. I'm pretty sure that's what this quote means:
"What precedes in the order of administration is called [the passive I take as referring to Scripture: 'is called by Scripture'] the cause of what follows". (Reply to this) (Thread) |
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(Anonymous)
2007-10-25 00:22
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you'll only start to get a handle on the "cause" stuff if you read some good summaries of what Aristotle and his Christian Glove Puppet Thomas Aquinas had to say about the various types of causes (e.g. material, formal, & final)
bp(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread) |
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