Did Sin Never Enter God's Mind?

Does Jeremiah 19:5 count as a substantive critique of Reformed theology? Did sin really never enter the mind of God?

Enjoy the show!

For more on Reformed Theology, click HERE.

Christian Huls - A Response to His Objection to Calvinism: Part One

In a recent blog post, Christian Huls gives a litany of reasons for why he is not a Calvinist. Ostensibly he believes that these are valid, reasonable, and Biblical objections to Reformed Soteriology, namely Calvinism. In responding to these comments, I hope to show that his comments do not provide any real substantive objections to Calvinism or belief that Calvinism is the Biblical view. I should note here however that I am not attempting to prove Calvinism is true or Biblical. I am simply responding to his objections. This means that to defeat his objections I merely need to show that they are either not accurate to Calvinism, incorrectly evaluate an entailment of Calvinism, presuppose Huls own view and thus rely on question begging, or incorrectly interpret a Biblical passage as teaching something that Huls thinks that it does. For this last kind of response, since Huls is often making the harder claim that Calvinism is contrary to the Bible, in these cases, I do not even need to show that Calvinism provides the best understanding of the passage(s) in question (though I think it does), but rather I must merely demonstrate that there is nothing contrary to what the Scripture teaches. That is, that there is no possible way to read the passage in a responsible manner inline with Calvinistic theology. Due to the fact that Huls has made the much stronger claim in these cases, it make my job enormously easier, so I’ll  thank him in advance for trying to shoot for the stars here. Due to this, I will often not need to make my case from the scriptures. Some will have a problem with this, but remember, I’m not even attempting to here show that Calvinism is true and Biblical. That’s not the burden that I bear in this series. I am not providing a positive case for the truth of Calvinism. I am responding to claims made against it. So Scripture will be used to cross reference points, show inconsistencies with Huls’ own comments with other passages, etc. but readers should not expect me to be presenting the Biblical case for Calvinism in this project. To that end, I also readily admit that at the end of this, even if all my rejoinders go through and every one of Huls’ objections is defeated, this will not show that Calvinism is true or Biblical. Rather, all it will demonstrate is that is not falsified by the kinds of objections that Huls provides.

Procedurally, I have put Huls’ comments in bold typeface and have offset his “reasons” numerically. My comments follow his. His article begins with a single statement that I would like to address first. Huls writes,

 

I reject Calvinism because it is riddled with contradictions, most especially about the nature of God.

Here is the first case where Huls radically overstates his case, even by his own arguments that follow. Most of Mr. Huls’ own list would not even qualify as contradictions since they do not entail that Calvinism affirms both a proposition and its negation. A contradiction is X and ~X. It is not that X entails Y and someone thinks Y is false. What Huls seems to mean is that Calvinism, on his view, just contains falsehoods. We will see shortly that his objections often beg the question, border on the trivial, redefine or equivocate on terms, proof text without any exegetical reflection or engagement with Calvinistic exegetical scholarship, etc. While I appreciate my discussions with Huls and consider him to be a brother and commend his zealous defense of the Word, in this case, his own theological presuppositions have led him to some rather superficial and myopic engagements with Reformed thought and theology in how we understand what the Bible teaches.

Now, let us proceed to the first five reasons that he gives.

 

1.       Calvinism makes God partial in arbitrarily selecting some for salvation and not others, when Scripture says that there is NO partiality with God (Deuteronomy 10:17; 2Chronicles 19:7; Job 34:19; Matthew 22:16; Mark 12:14; Luke 20:21; Acts 10:34; Romans 2:11; Galatians 2:6; 1Peter 1:17).

“Arbitrary” is a word with various uses. IF we mean it in the sense that it is done based on the choice of one person rather than due to a law dictating something, then sure. In that sense of the term, election is arbitrary. God chose it and it was not the necessary outcome of some law imposed upon him.

However, this is clearly not how the objection means the term since even on most non-Calvinist views God is not bound by laws external to himself and they do not think that God acting for his purposes apart of laws is a bad thing. So this objection that somehow the supposed arbitrariness of God in election given Calvinism would be a bad thing, cannot mean such an innocuous sense of the term.

They clearly mean it in the more common usage of the term that for something to be arbitrary is for it to be random or on a whim, rather than for any reason. However, if that is the way the objection must use the term, then it fails to be an objection that works against Calvinism. On Calvinism, election is unconditional in the sense that it is not based on a character or action that we do – it is not because we are rich or poor, Jew or gentile, slave or free, man or woman, strong or weak, smart or…. not. However, that does not mean that God does not have reasons for his selection for his own purposes (as we are told in Eph. 1:5; 1:11). The Calvinist view is not some kind of random cosmic lottery or dart board. That just is not our view. It merely means that God’s election of individuals is not conditioned by anything that they will or work (Rom. 9:14).

This means that in a banal sense election would be arbitrary, but in such a way that it would be unobjectionable even to non-Calvinists like Huls. Yet it would not be arbitrary in the sense that the criticism means the term.

 

2.       Calvinism makes God inequitable in irresistibly saving some, and not the rest, when God says that He established equity (Psalm 99:4), “delights in uprightness/equity” (1Chronicles 29:17), and “will judge the world… with uprightness/equity” (Psalm 9:8; 75:2; 96:10; 98:9; see also Psalm 17:2; Isaiah 45:19).  Note that the Hebrew word for “uprightness/equity” is מֵישָׁרִים (MYShaRIM), which means “level, order, or fairness.” Isaiah even says that “the way of the righteous IS equity,” and then he prays and asks God to make the path of the righteous LEVEL (or equal)” (Isaiah 26:7). 

This objection is found in the pages of Scripture! I really like when this happens because if we all agree that the Scripture is our authority on these issues, then we should believe it when it expressly says something right? So where is this found? In Romans 9, after Paul says that God chose Jacob over Esau before “the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls…” Paul repeats in FOUR ways that it had nothing to do with the twins or their actions or choices. God chose Jacob:

a) before they were born

b) before they had done good or bad

c) so it would be God’s purpose according to his choice / because it is his choice to call

d) NOT because of their actions

What does Paul say next? Well, he anticipates and objection from his reader to the idea that God’s election is based on his purposes alone and not based on anything we will or work or want. And what is that objection? It is the exact objection that Huls provides – well that is unjust/inequitable! Paul writes, “What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? Far from it!” (9:14) So I am greatly encouraged that my theological commitments get the exact same objections that Paul’s did. Think about it. If Paul was teaching that God elects those who choose him first and repent and believe, would anyone object to it as being unfair/unjust? There are plenty of objections against that view, but it being unfair/unjust isnt one of them. So, if Paul believed and was teaching in line with Huls, the objection just would not make any sense whatsoever.

We can also answer further that since all humanity is in sin, that all humanity deserves wrath. So, for God to chose to save the ones that he chooses for his purposes is not unfair/unjust. He does not owe salvation to anyone. Thus, the fact that he saves any at all is mercy, not justice.

In addition, Calvinists affirm that salvation comes to all – Jew, gentiles, slave, free, rich, poor, powerful, oppressed, man, woman, young, old, etc. When the Bible speaks of equity/uprightness it speaks of using equal scales, treating all people fairly, etc. For the criticism to be valid against Calvinism, we would need to be saying that God will save the rich but not the poor, or he will save men but not women. Those kinds of inequitable scales are simply not what is affirmed by Calvinism and  thus the claim of inequity or injustice simply reveals a lack of understanding of Biblical concepts and of Calvinistic thought.

 

3.       Calvinism makes God unloving to the majority of His creation as He did not sacrifice His Son for them, when Scripture teaches that God is infinitely loving (Exodus 34:6; Isaiah 63:9; Jeremiah 31:3; Micah 7:18; Luke 11:42; John 3:16; Romans 5:8; 8:37; 2Corinthians 13:11, 14; Galatians 5:22; Ephesians 2:4; *3:19; 5:2; 2Timothy 1:7; Titus 3:4; *1John 4:8-10, 16, 19), that He loves all men (John 3:16; Titus 3:4), and He defines love as sacrificial and unconditional (1John 3:16; Romans 5:8; see also John 3:16).

This objection has numerous problems. First, it does not follow that because the atonement of Christ is not effectual for any but the elect that therefore it is not sufficient for the reprobate or that God is unloving to them. This would be like saying that because God only provided a means of atonement for his chosen people Israel in the Old Covenant, that the Old Covenant makes God unloving since God is infinitely loving and yet did not provide sacrifices for the Moabites or the Amorites or those living on the Asian Steps or in what is now Madagascar. Does that make God unloving because he set his special redeeming covenant love on his chosen people? Of course not.

It should also be noted here that Calvinism does not claim that there was no general or common grace elements accomplished on the cross. The claim is merely the atonement accomplished in Christ’ blood was effectually won only for the elect, and not for the reprobate. So, it is false if one thinks that a Calvinist believes that the only thing accomplished by the cross was the effectual atonement for the elect.

 

4.       MANY Calvinists claim that God actively hates the lost, when hating is a deed of the flesh, contrary to the Spirit of God (Galatians 5:19-20) and He commands us that rather than hating our enemies, we are to love them (Matthew 5:43-44) and do good to them (Luke 6:27; see also Proverbs 25:21; Romans 12:20). 

Simply because some Calvinists claim it does not mean it is a feature of Calvinism. I do not even see how this means that Calvinism is not true simply because some people claim this. This is like the atheist who says that they cannot be a Christian because their aunt was a Christian and she said something racist at Thanksgiving once. I’ll take it that this suffices as an answer since this isnt even really an objection to anything exclusively Calvinistic.

 

5.       Calvinism claims that God does not desire the salvation of all men, when Scripture says God is not willing that ANY should perish (Matthew 18:14), but rather that He desires that ALL would come to repentance (2Peter 3:9), that ALL men be saved and for ALL to come to the knowledge of the truth (1Timothy 2:3-4).

Context matters. As I will show, simply proof texting these verse as if they say what Huls wants them to simply does not engage with the Calvinistic exegetical case and does not present a clear exegetical case for the view espoused by Huls. He needs to demonstrate his case in the face of the exegesis of Calvinist theologians and not merely beg the question of his view.

-          MATTHEW 18:14. The text simply does not say that God is not willing that any should perish, full stop. It is speaking of children specifically and it is why Jesus says that “it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven for one of these little ones to perish.” In addition, this falls on the heels of the warning to not cause child to stumble and sin or it would be better to have a stone tied around your neck and thrown in the sea, and then the command to cut off your hand or gouge out your eye if they cause you to sin. After that, he then gives the parable about a man going to find his lost sheep and rejoicing more over the one who was found than the 99 who stayed. Only then does he say “it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven for one of these little ones to perish.” This is an expression of what Calvinists call the moral or prescriptive will of God – it is a tragic evil when children are forced or wander off into sin. It is simply a mistake to think that this is a soteriological passage, at least not directly. There may be indirect applications and allusions to salvation, but that is not the primary point of the passage.

 

-          2 PETER 3:9. Starting in v8 we read. “8 But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. 9 The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not willing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.”

Notice here that the issue is responding to those who are mocking and saying that Jesus will not come because it has taken too long already. Peter is saying that they should be patient and he says this for two reasons. First, time is not the same for God as it is for us. So for his audience which may have already waited a few decades (a full lifetime for many of them) they may think that it has been a long time, but Peter reminds them that is has not and that with God a day is like a thousand years so they may have waited 30 years but that isnt even like a day with God. Wait until a 1000 years and  that may be like one day in the providence of God.

 

Second, Peter then reminds  them that God is not slow but is patient. And who is he patient toward? “You” (ὑμᾶς). This is the second person plural pronoun – “y’all,” This is the object of the verb – God is not willing that any of y’all perish, but for all (πάντας) to come to repentance. The promise that Peter has for the church is that God is patient, not wanting any of y’all to perish but for all y’all to come to repentance. The πάντας in the final clause is not a universal all to every person.

 

It would be like me talking to a handful of my friends who are getting worried that dinner at my house might be cancelled because I don’t seem to have started serving it yet. They know I invited over more of our group of friends too. So I tell them that I’m waiting to start dinner because I’m patient toward my friends, not wanting any to miss dinner.

To supporting pronoun in the final clause modifies the object in the main clause. It simply does not mean that I am patient toward my friends because I want ALL PEOPLE EVERYONE IN ALL TIME to have dinner at my house. That just is not how grammar works.

 

-          1 TIMOTHY 2:3-4. Here the context is that Paul is commanding Timothy to pray for all. But while all means all, all isnt all that all means. That is, just because πάντας is used here for “all men,” just like in the previous example context matters. Paul commands Timothy to prayer for all and then he mentions expressly kings and those who are in authority. It is in this context that we find the statement referenced, “This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

 

However, Paul follows this by saying “For there is one God, and one mediator also between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave Himself as a ransom for all, the testimony given at the proper time. 7 For this I was appointed as a preacher and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), as a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.”

 

Notice that this desire for all to be saved is explained by Paul’s appeal that there is one God of all, and one mediator, and that it is because of that fact that Paul was appointed to the gentiles. This is an example of the fact that God was not just the God of the Jews. Jesus is not a Jewish mediator who only brings Jews to God – God and Jesus are for Jews and Gentiles! This is why Paul was commissioned as a teacher to the Gentiles. This verse fits the ubiquitous New Testament them, not that Jesus died for every single person or that God wants every single person to be saved, but that God and Jesus and the gospel are for all nations, tongues, tribes, and peoples. It is not just for the Jews but also for the Gentiles.

 

Paul then follows his normal motif of expanding this basic gospel consideration that it is not just for Jews but that it is also for men and women. Throughout his corpus, Paul regularly moves from “Jew/Gentile” to “man/woman.” And this is precisely what he does here. In 2:8-15, Paul moves from praying for kings and those in power to live dignified lives and mentioning Jews and Gentiles, to then talking about the having men pray and how men and women live dignified lives.

 

This verse does not demonstrate that God desires all people to be saved in the same kind of effectual saving way as he does the elect. It is about that the gospel is not an in-group / out-group exclusive club for the rich and powerful Jewish men of the world. It is for literally all kinds of people!

 

6.       Calvinism teaches that God condemns people for His good pleasure, but God says that He takes NO PLEASURE in the death of the wicked but would rather they repent and LIVE (Ezekiel 33:11).

This is a simple equivocation on the term “pleasure” based on a misunderstanding of Reformed theology. The term חָפֵץ used in Ezekiel 33:11 is the term which means something like to delight in. This is a kind of pleasure used in delighting in good food or wine or a spouse. There is a secondary meaning of the term however that does mean to desire to do something and this is typically what the Reformed confessions and professions mean when we say that it was by God’s good pleasure. We mean it was by the counsel of his will, his plan, his purposes. We do not mean that he takes some kind of personal delight in their deaths (the first sense of חָפֵץ). We do mean the second sense. And this is in fact precisely how this term is used in the Old Testament to describe God wanting the death of the wicked. We see in 1 Samuel 2:25b after Eli rebuked his sons for their wickedness, the narrator tells us that Eli’s sons “would not listen to the voice of their father, for the Lord desired (חָפֵץ) to put them to death.” This is precisely the same term used in Ezekiel 33:11. In fact, notice here that the causal arrow goes from the consequent to the antecedent. Why do the sons not listen? For/because God planned to put them to death.

So, if Huls would like us to think that Ezekiel 33:11 means that God can have no desire whatsoever for the death of the wicked by his plan and counsel, then he would be forced to admit a true Biblical contradiction. Thus, when Calvinists say that it is by God’s pleasure (his will/plan) for the wicked to perish before being able to repent and believe, we mean it precisely in the 1 Samuel 2:25 sense and not the Ezekiel 33:11 sense.

 

 

7.       Calvinism makes God ungracious to the majority of His creation, when He says that He is the God of ALL grace (1Peter 5:10) who gives grace to all (John 1:14-17; Romans 5:15-21; Titus 2:11; Ephesians 4:7).

God is certainly the God of all grace. But where does it follow from that that not giving grace to every person is being ungracious? The term in the New Testament for grace is χάρις and means grace or favor and typically refers to something unearned, unmerited, and not required on the part of the giver. If we follow Huls’ understand, for God to be gracious he must show grace to all people without exception. This would then mean that giving grace would no longer be gracious! It would just be required. This certainly cannot be the case for God does not show the same grace to those in hell as he does to those in heaven. Now for Huls, those in heaven may have met the condition of believing, sure. But then if God shows all grace to all people, this would mean that he would show even conditional grace to all people. Certainly, such universalism is not what Huls would go for, but his argument here seems to necessitate it.

In addition, we have the same issue as before with the universalizing of the term of the term “all” to be “all without exception” when time and time again, the majority use of the term is something like “all without distinction” which fits far more comfortably with the Biblical theme of the inclusivity of the gospel.

This seems also to run afoul of Romans 9 where we are told that God sovereignly chooses whom he will have mercy on (the flip side of grace needed to make grace just) and that this is done before people are born and is not based on who wants/wills or works. Do we say that God is unmerciful because he tells us that he does not show mercy to all? Obviously not and this would result in one affirming the “that’s not fair/that’s unjust” objections which Paul’s interlocutor protests with in 9:14 and 21.

 

8.       Calvinism makes God unmerciful to the majority of His creation, when Scripture reveals that He is abundant in mercy (Ephesians 2:4), His mercy is over ALL His works (Psalm 145:8–9), and He desires to show mercy to ALL (Romans 11:32).

See the answer above as this is precisely what I anticipated. If Huls wants to press passages like Romans 11:32 to mean that God must be merciful to all in the same way or else he is unmerciful, then he must admit to a direct contradiction of Romans 9 where Paul categorically shows that God is intentionally unmerciful to many. So Huls here can either press his anti-Calvinistic rhetoric and affirm a Biblical contradiction, or he can abandon his objection.

 

 

9.       Calvinism makes God uncompassionate to the majority of His creation, when God says that He is compassionate (Deuteronomy 4:31), and His compassion never fails (Lamentations 3:22, 32).

Here Huls seems to merely be on a copy and paste binge, replacing grace for mercy for compassion. Must I go through the litany of examples where God is demonstrably and expressly not compassionate to persons? Was he compassionate during the flood? Was he compassionate to Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities on the plain? Was he compassionate to Pharaoh? What about the innocent first born of the Egyptians – was he compassionate to them? Was he compassionate when he placed various nations under חָרַם (holy war/the ban) to wipe out all their men, women, children, pregnant women, nursing infants, etc.? Was he compassionate to the Israelites when he brought in Assyria and Babylon to slaughter, rape, pillage, plunder, and carry them off into exile? To pretend as if God is not savingly compassionate to all persons equally somehow makes God uncompassionate is to simply reveal one’s complete and utter lack of reading and reflection on Biblical passages and to focus on such a myopic, romanticized concept of YHWH as being a butterfly rather than a holy hurricane. God’s wrath and justice and holiness simply do not stand in opposition to his compassion. God showed compassion to Noah and his family but not to the other inhabitants of the land. Does that make him uncompassionate? According to Huls romanticized concept of God, maybe it does. But that is not the holy God of the Bible. That is not YHWH. Does Paul tell us expressly in Romans 9 (citing from Ex. 33:19) that God will have compassion on whom he has compassion, and this is contrasted with those whom he hardens (i.e. does not show compassion to) in v16-19.

 

 

10.   Calvinism makes God unjust for condemning people to hell for something they have no control over, when God is a God of justice (Isaiah 30:18).

This objection begs the question that it would be unjust for God to condemn people to hell for something that they “have no control over”. Notice that this is exactly the objection that Paul anticipates from his interlocutor in Romans 9. After saying that God chose Isaac and not Ishmael and that he chose Jacob and not Esau, and that this was done completely out of their control (see again my answer to objection #2), the objection comes “What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there?” (9:14). To which Paul replies, “Far from it!” And this is clearly an example of mercy and hardening in judgement since he expressly applies this divine prerogative to choose apart from human control to mercy and hardening. “So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.” This follows with a similar objection,

                “You will say to me then, “Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?”

Notice again Huls’ voice in this objection to Pauline theology. How is it fair for God to find us at fault (i.e. condemn) when people cannot resist his will (have no control)? Here I would much rather stick with Paul and the Biblical view of God as the sovereign rather than try to prop up humans as a sovereign ones and have the objections to Paul come from my lips. I would rather bend the knew to Paul than shake my fist at the heavens, quoting Invictus, and demanding God respect my autonomy and captainship of my own soul.

Is Calvinism semi-Gnosticism?

What do Leighton Flowers and Richard Carrier have in common? Let's find out... 

For anyone involved in the debates between Calvinism and non-Calvinism, a rising trend that most have observed is the accusation that Calvinism can or should be considered a kind of neo or semi-Gnosticism. This largely comes from one group of anti-Calvinists known as SBC “Traditionalists,” also called Provisionists. They are headed up by Leighton Flowers at the anti-Calvinist group Soteriology101.

This accusation was largely born out of their frustration at being called semi-Pelagians. Flowers and company have often called this a “boogyman” term used to poison the well against their position. So Flowers, either by invention or plagiarism (it wouldn’t be his first time), started saying that it would be like if they started calling Calvinists “semi-Pelagians” in order to poison the well against the Calvinists with a term that is almost entirely historically negative in orthodox theological circles.

As far as I can tell, Flowers thankfully doesn’t make the argument that Calvinists actually ARE gnostics in any meaningful sense but is just saying that the tone of the term would be LIKE that. However, this hasn’t stopped his adoring fans from taking the argument there. So how does the argument work, is it valid and is there any precedent to it?

Provisionism and Semi-Pelagianism

Well before we get to that, let me first show that the accusation that Provisionists ARE semi-Pelagians is NOT the same kind of claim. So let’s really quickly walk through that issue.

First, the accusation that Provisionism just is re-packaged Semi-Pelagianism is either true or false. I think it is true, and people like Flowers, I assume, think it is false. But then they should argue that. We have well-defined terms for sets of doctrines throughout history. Pelagianism, Semi-Pelagianism, Augustinianism, Calvinism, Gnosticism are all such terms. Whatever evaluative connotations that the terms carry is irrelevant to whether or not a position falls either narrowly or broadly under the set of doctrines that these terms historically describe. Tantruming about it being a boogyman doesn’t do anything but show that you do not like being associated with the term. But if it walks like semi-Pelagianism, looks like a semi-Pelagianism, has the dogma of semi-Pelagianism… well if the shoe fits…

Which leads to my second point. I have frequently asked Provisionists to describe to me the substantive differences between their view and Semi-Pelagianism. I know tons of others who have asked the same thing. And the only answer we ever get…. Crickets. That’s it. We will be insulted and ridiculed and Provisionists will rage quit, or they will start calling us semi-Gnostics, which I’ll address shortly…. But they never can give any real substantive theological difference… I usually try to disambiguate concepts as best I can – even ones that I think are false or foolish or dangerous. I have no reason to consider Provisionism to be nearly identical, if not identical, to semi-Pelagianism unless it is. If it’s not semi-Pelagian, then great. I still would think it false, it just wouldn’t fall into that category. That is, I don’t really have a polemical reason or motivation to include them under the umbrella of semi-Pelagianism to make my case that their view is downright false. That is, nothing is really gained EXCEPT for lexical accuracy by considering them under that umbrella. So if they can demonstrate how they are not under that umbrella, great. They should do so. But they need to do so by showing the doctrinal differences between their theology and semi-Pelagianism. And so far… to my knowledge and in my interactions, that has not even remotely happened.

So what is semi-Pelagianism? Well I’m not going to go into much of the history – you can read pretty much any historical theology and get that. But in basic terms, following the nearly universal condemnation of Pelagianism in the 4^th century, a small group tried to make some mediating steps from Pelagianism toward a more orthodox position. In the 5^th and 6^th century the movement affirmed, roughly, the following positions:

1.       Sin had corrupted nature and man’s environment and was a pervasive influence to evil but did not make the natural constitution of man unable to freely choose God without direct divine intervention (Contra Augustinianism – and later Arminianism).

2.       Without God’s grace this corruptive force could not be overcome by man alone (contra Pelagianism). [1 and 2 should not be confused with affirming Original Sin. They did not think it was impossible or that man was unable to choose God, but rather that the influence of external powers would be too powerful for us to not succumb to them. And so we get to #3.]

3.       The innate corruptive force over man was not so great that the beginning of faith (initium fidei) was beyond the powers of man’s native will.

4.       The increase of faith (augmentum fidei) after conversion, is dependent upon God.

5.       The justified man may of his own strength persevere to the end.

6.       The justified man may of his own sake forsake his gift of salvation and be lost.

7.       Both God and the human person always participate in the salvation process – salvation is synergistic but not meritorious.

8.       Humans, all humans, before and after conversion, make libertarianly free will choices.

9.       God aides the human will through creation, natural grace, "supernatural" grace, the gospel proclamation and restrictions on demonic invasion.

10.   God responds in grace to the human’s choice to exhibit faith in him.

Now, that is a rough outline of semi-Pelagianism. Unlike Pelagianism which easily affirmed the possibility of sinless perfection, the semi-Pelagian is uncomfortable with that prospect, however they want to persevere the natural ability of man to repent and choose God by their own libertarian freedom. And so they too, like the Pelagian, must deny original sin and total depravity. And yet they do not want sinless perfection to be in view so they say that our natural will, instead of being free from the power of sin like the Pelagian, or dead to God because of sin like the Augustinian, they say it is sick in sin and while it could always choose the good, it wont because of the external powerful influence of a sin sick creation and relations to other sinful people. But denying original sin, has it’s logical consequences. Unlike Arminians who really are semi-Augustinians who affirm original sin and total depravity, and insert Prevenient Grace as a special act of God to enable the will of man at conversion, Semi-Pelagians need no such gracious assistance to enable the will. Sure they say God needs to bring us to the water, but they still say, we freely and autonomously choose to drink.

So the question is, how much of the above set of doctrines does one need to affirm to be broadly under the umbrella of semi-Pelagianism. Unless Calvinism where the 5 points are logically entailed by the others and only work as a full system, this is not the case for semi-Pelagianism. So it becomes far more like the problem of a heap – when is a pile of mables a heap… how many can you take away before it stops being a heap?

So how many of these does the Provisionist need to affirm to be semi-Pelagians? Well I think the ones that are distinctive to semi-Pelagianism are the denial of original sin, the denial of a kind of total depravity where the will is dead to God in sin and in dead of a special act of God (whether prevenient grace on Arminianism or regeneration on Calvinism) before it can act in faith, and yet that sinless perfection, while possible will never happen because of the external influence of sin in our environment and relationships is the core of semi-Pelagianism as opposed to full-Pelagianism or semi- and full Augustinianism.

Anyone familiar with Provisionism will know that the official statements affirm each of these. In fact they affirm nearly every single one of the 10 doctrinal stances I listed above – with the exception that someone, once justified, can lose/give up their salvation. And even that, if we are being honest, while the official Provisionist statement denies, I rarely meet a Provisionist who doesn’t think that a believer can give up their salvation.

Now, if the Provisionist can show some substantive doctrinal differences between the official Provisionist doctrinal system and historic semi-Pelagianism, I will  be more than happy to stop including them in that group. But as of right now… I’m at a loss for how they are not doctrinally included in that group. They may not like the label – great, then argue that semi-Pelagianism shouldn’t be considered heresy anymore. But simply saying that you aren’t semi-Pelagian just because you don’t like the evaluative connotation of the term… sorry. That just does not hold water.

Now, the typical response I get to this then, is “well you Calvinists are semi-Gnostics then!” So let’s turn and explore if this tu quoque argument is a good and reasonable response.

Calvinism and semi-Gnosticism

Let’s start by first briefly stating what Gnosticism was around the time of the early church. Gnosticism was a system of pagan religious beliefs concerning the cosmos being ruled by a lesser deity (called the demiurge) and that matter qua matter was evil and to be escaped while spirit was true reality. There was a hard dualism between matter and spirit such that all matter was bad and needed to be escaped. Because of this hard dualism, the gnostics believed that the spirit (not to be confused with the person of the Holy Spirit but rather something like “the spiritual nature of reality”) was accessed via secret cultic rituals only by an elite class of worthy acolytes. And this then gained them secret and elevated knowledge (gnosis) by which they could be progressively set free from the material world.

On this system, the great/supreme god is entirely unknowable and birthed the powers that rule the cosmos (called the aeons), as well as the creator god who also birthed the demiurge – So you have the great god, birthing the creator god, who birthed the demiurge who ruled the cosmos. Gnosticism has no concept of sin, only ignorance, and to achieve salvation you need to have secret knowledge mentioned above.

When this Gnosticism started to infect the church, it somewhat moved away from the pagan mystery cults and took on a “Christian” flavor (although nothing about it was genuinely Christian). So because of their hard dualism with regard to matter and spirit, they believed that the demiurge, who birthed the Son Jesus, sent Jesus to only appear to be human. But since matter is innately evil, they denied a true bodily incarnation – which means no actual crucifixion, no death. This was the error of the Docetics who John appeared to be writing against in his 1^st and 2^nd epistles. They also held onto the idea that salvation was not done by the shed blood of Christ (since he didn’t have real blood to be shed) but was done still by gaining secret knowledge meant only for the super-spiritual – the elites, the ones inaugurated into the truth and it was simply the gaining of this knowledge that saved someone.

Now, even if you do not agree with Calvinism, does any of that sound like Calvinism? No, of course not. There is literally zero doctrinal overlap between Calvinism and any form of Gnosticism, and the implications of gnosticism (such as the denial of the trinity, God as Creator, and the humanity of Christ, salvation from sin by the death of Christ on the cross, etc.) make it utterly anathema to Calvinists. We Calvinists dont think flesh is evil. We think the flesh is currently subject to the wages of sin. We are not anti-materialists. In fact, we look forward to the resurrection of our bodies! Gnostics believed that matter, all matter, was evil and to be escaped and ultimately done away with.

 So "gnosticism" is not an accurate historical theological term for the position.

In fact, something like Scientology is actually VERY gnostic. But there is literally zero doctrinal overlap between Calvinism and Gnosticism, beyond some super vague dishonestly worded phrases that would make ALL orthodox Christianity "gnostic” such as that our flesh is wicked and the spirit is good but that isn’t because of the nature of matter and spirit, but of the moral impacts of sin and righteousness! There is a dualism in Christianity between sin and righteousness but if that dualism makes Calvinism in the same dualist boat as Gnosticism, then so are the Biblical authors. So that cannot be it.

So now that we see that the label is simply inaccurate and false as a description of Calvinism, let us now ask where does this claim from the Provisionist come from? Well the best I can tell, it comes from two faulty considerations:

1.       Calvinism is a kind of Augustinianism. There is a notion in scholarship that Augustine was influenced by his prior life in a gnostic sect known as Manichaeism. And so therefore, Calvinism is influenced by Manichaeism.

2.       Calvinism affirms that Christians are the elect of God, chosen entirely by God in eternity past. And that who the elect are is simply not revealed to us. So it is rooted in the secret will of God. This is knowledge that known only to God. So secret knowledge… Gnosticism.

So what do we make of these two assumptions?

First, the idea that Calvinism is influenced by the gnosticisim of Manichaeism because Augustine was supposedly influenced by it commits what is known as the genetic fallacy. How Augustine did or did not come to his beliefs about the teaching of the Scriptures is simply not a valid argument against if his understanding of the Scriptures is true or not. The genetic fallacy seeks to deny a claim by attacking the means or the conditions under which someone came to hold that the belief is true. This is simply a fallacious way to argue.

Second, it also commits a guilt by association fallacy. Even IF the genetic fallacy didn’t exist, most Calvininsts are Calvinists because we think it is the best systematic and exegetical understanding of the Scripture. I know very few Calvinists who have read Augustine, let alone got their understanding of the Bible from him. I actually cant think of a single one. What happens is that typically we come to be convinced of the system by reading the Bible, we start finding other people who have held similar views and come to find out, “oh… there is a name for this – Calvinism.” And then the further we study, “Oh... this view long pre-dated the Reformation in Augustinianism.” And that’s about it. So even IF it were a good argument that Augustine only held his view because of his prior life in Manichaeism (which is clearly fallacious) it still would be fallacious to use that as an argument against Calvinists today.

Third, was Augustine actually that influenced by his Manichaeism? I’m not going to go into that here, but I think the answer is clearly no, at least not in the sense that he affirmed beliefs because they were in line with Manichaeism. His prior life in Gnosticism clearly influenced what kind of issues he found important and how he understand the pagans around him – I mean my prior life in Atheism influences how I understand skepticism, naturalism, and atheism and what issues I choose to address and how I phrase things to atheists, and so forth. But it’s not that I have an “atheistic hangover” that causes me to affirm unbiblical things. Typically the kinds of things that people will point to in order to try an demonstrate that Augustine was still influenced by Manichaeism, is his “dualism” between the flesh and the spirit, the wretchedness of the natural man vs the righteousness of the spirit. The problem is that this just is a Biblical view. It is not that the flesh is evil because it is material, but rather it is that it is evil because it is fallen and corrupted by sin. Paul makes these exact points at numerous points in his epistles (namely Romans culminating in Romans 7). Christians the world over who aren’t Augustinian, Reformed, or Calvinistic also affirm that this just is what the Bible teaches.

So this, like most of the other reasons given for this kind of argument about Augustine, makes an equivocation fallacy by assuming that the dualism in Manichaeism just is the dualism in Augustinianism, and/or it makes another genetic fallacy that this is why Augustine believes it. It couldn’t possibly be because… well… that’s just what the bible teaches…

Ok so that was enough to show that the first assumption made to try and push this semi-Gnostic label on Calvinism is false. What about the second one? Is Calvinism built on a secret knowledge – a gnosis? No of course not. At least not in any meaningfully significant way.

Remember, on any version of Gnosticism, it was the gaining of the gnosis by the human observant which brought them into the spirit, to escape the material and be saved. And it was secret to the world – it was only for the super spiritual. So it was a personal secret knowledge of the acolyte that saved them.

On Calvinism, the only secret knowledge is God’s own knowledge of his decree of election. On literally any view of election, this is true. Flowers’ own view of corporate election would have this – unless Flowers thinks that God has revealed to him who would believe and fill the body? Does he think God has revealed to him who will and will not believe in the world God has chosen to actualize? Of course not! So… is he a semi-Gnostic? No. That would be silly.

On Calvinism, nothing about the gospel, preaching the word, or anything is secret. It is to be preached freely to all – we just don’t know who the elect are and who will eventually come to salvation. But that secret knowledge of God is not what saves us! That isn’t some secret knowledge given only to the spiritual elite, whereby knowing it, saves the believer.

On Calvinism, the gospel of Christ is public and given to all and we are saved by the finished work of Christ on the cross and given new life by his resurrection – his material, bodily resurrection from the dead which gives us the hope in a future material, bodily resurrection! Absolutely nothing about this is Gnosticism in any form.

**UPDATE 3/27, 11:18am**

It was brought to my attention that in the first draft of this article, I did not address the claim that Calvinism may be Gnostic because it is deterministic. That is, that it was the determinism that Augustine had borrowed from the Manicheans. I honestly had not forgot this, but think this is even more absurd a claim. I was trying to give the stronger of the possible ways that the argument could be made via what could be more complex epistemological considerations about beliefs. However, since several people asked about the determinism claim, let me briefly respond to that issue.  

Notice that this would still commit the three problems above (the guilt by association fallacy, the genetic fallacy and the inability to show that Augustine believed it because of Manicheism rather than from scriptural considerations). So the argument does not even get off the ground. Remember, not only is it entirely irrelevant about why Augustine came to believe what he did about what the Bible teaches (genetic fallacy), and unless the Provisionist is able to raise the dead and question Augustine about what led to his belief in determinism (or be able to show some statement where he attributes his belief to his prior gnostic worldview despite repeatedly denouncing and refuting it), but also no Calvinist ever says that they believe it because of Augustine. We believe it because we think that it is what Scripture teaches and when we look through history, Augustine is one the people that we find who robustly makes the case for the same position.

Now, the Provisionist may then say that motivations are irrelevant to their argument because, like the issue with semi-Pelagianism, it is whether we agree with doctrines of the system to be included under that umbrella. And so they claim that Gnostics affirmed determinism and Calvinism affirms determinism and so they are under the same umbrella in such a way that it is accurate to call Calvinism “semi-Gnostic.” Fair enough, but is that accurate?

Not really for several reasons.

First, it would remove all of the talk of Augustine and the Manicheans from consideration. But that is a main pillar of the Provisionist claim. Without that, it is hard to sustain the rest of the case for their argument.

Second, the issue is what are substantive or distinctive doctrines that two systems overlap. So we would not say that Calvinism is Pelagian because they both affirm Theism, the Resurrection, and the Pauline authorship of the book of Romans for example. We could multiply a whole host of beliefs that countless views have in common – but they are not the uniquely defining doctrines of the systems. They are trivial parallels that countless views have in common. Determinism seems to be just such a doctrine. Without writing a whole new article here and making this post unnecessarily long, I am simply not convinced by the claims that the early church only and exclusively affirmed Libertarian notions of freedom and denied predestination and determinism. I find when reading the arguments for this view that they very much beg the question of what is being said like they do with the Biblical text. The argument often goes:

1.       Some early church father (ECF)/Bible passage says to make a choice or perform a command.

2.       I believe that choice and meaningful commands are only possible on an Incompatiblist/Libertarian concept of freedom.

Therefore,

3.       Some ECF/Bible passage teaches Incompatiblistic/Libertarian freedom.

Premise 2 simply begs the question of position that the person is trying to garner support for. As a Compatiblist, I have absolutely no problem understanding choice/command passages in either Scripture or the ECFs in the same way that as a Compatiblist, I make choise/command statements to my children, wife, friends, at work, etc. What happens then, is that because the position being argued for has been assumed, whatever text in front of us becomes a wax nose to whatever the reader wants it to be. For the record, I find that this happens when many different positions go to the ECFs to support their view. This is because often, the ECFs don’t well define or hash out their views but simply parrot the Biblical language verbatim. And so the reader is looking to support their view about what the Bible teaches from the ECFs, finds them saying the thing that they have already interpreted in the Scripture to support their position, and then comes away feeling like the ECFs support their views.

Now, continuing on, not only do I think that determinism can be clearly adduced from the Scriptures and so I do not need to go to the ECFs, I think we have at least plausible counter evidence from the ECFs affirming a kind of Augustinian notion of determinism/predestination. We can see statements such as:

·         Clement of Rome (69 CE):

o   “When he wills, and as he wills, he does all things; none of those things which are decreed by him, shall pass away,” (Epist. ad Corinth. 1:p. 64.)

o   “All therefore are glorified and magnified, not by themselves or their own works of righteous actions, which they have wrought out, but by his will,” (Clement, Ep. 1, ad. Corinth. p. 72.).

o   “Whereas it is the will of God, that all whom he loves should partake of repentance, and so not perish with the unbelieving and impenitent, he has established it by his almighty will.’ But if any of those whom God wills should partake of the grace of repentance, should afterwards perish, where is his almighty will? And how is this matter settled and established by such a will of his?” (Ep. 1, ad Cor. p. 20).

·         Ignatius (110 CE)

o   Ignatius speaks of two sorts of persons, signified by, “two pieces of money; the one belongs to God, and the other to the world; which have each their own characters upon them, and every one shall go to his own place,” (Ignat. Epist. p. 32).

o   In predestination, “…there was such a difference between the infidels and the elect,” (Apud. ib. 50:4, c. 15, p. 134.)

o   “They that are carnal,” says he, “cannot do the things that are spiritual, nor they that are spiritual do the things that are carnal, as neither faith the things of unbelief, nor unbelief the things of faith,” (Ep. ad Ephesians p. 22.).

·         Justin Martyr (150 CE)

o   “The great things, which the Father hath in his counsel appointed for all men,” that are or shall be well-pleasing to him, and likewise those that depart from his will, whether angels or men, he only (Christ) hath most clearly taught, Matthew 8:11, 12, and 7:22, 23; and in other words, when he will condemn the unworthy that shall not be saved, he will say to them, “Go ye into outer darkness, which the Father hath prepared for Satan and his angels,” (Dialog. cum. Tryph. p. 301.)

o   “Mankind by Adam fell under death, and the deception of the serpent; that ‘we are born sinners;’ and that we are entirely flesh, and no good thing dwells in us; he asserts the weakness and disability of men either to understand or perform spiritual things, AND DENIES THAT MAN, BY THE NATURAL SHARPNESS OF HIS WIT, CAN ATTAIN TO THE KNOWLEDGE OF DIVINE THINGS, or by any innate power in him save himself, and procure eternal life,” (Epist. ad Zenam, p. 506.).

o   “Jesus died for men of every kind, not all men. “As Jacob served Laban for the cattle that were spotted, and of various forms, so Christ served even to the cross, for men of every kind, of many and various shapes, procuring them by his blood, and the mystery of the cross,” (Dialog. cum Tryph, p. 364.).

o   “Do you think, O men, that we could ever have been able to have understood these things in the Scriptures, unless by the will of him that wills these things, we had received grace to understand them,” (Dialog. cum Tryph. p. 346.).

·         Minutius Felix (170 CE)

o   “For what else is fate, but what God says of every one of us? Who, since he can foreknow matter, even determines the fates according to the merits and qualities of every one; so that not our nativity (that is, as depending on the position of the stars) but our natural disposition is punished.” (Min. Felix. Octav. p. 397. Ed. Elmenhorst. p. 39; ed. Oxon).

·         Irenaeus (180 CE)

o   “God predetermining all things for the perfection of man, and for the bringing about and manifestation of his dispositions, that goodness may be shown, and righteousness perfected, and the church be conformed to the image of his Son, and at length become a perfect man, and by such things be made ripe to see God, and enjoy him,” (Irenaeus adv. Haeres. 50:4, c. 72, p. 419.)

o   “God is not so poor and indigent as not to give to everybody its own soul as its proper form. Hence, having completed the number which he before determined with himself, all those who are written, or ordained unto life, shall rise again, having their own bodies, souls, and spirits, in which they pleased God; but those who are deserving of punishment shall go into it, having also their own souls and bodies in which they departed from the grace of God,” (L. 2, c. 62, inter Fragment. Graec. ad. calcem).

·         Clement of Alexandria (190 CE)

o   “According to the fitness which everyone has, He, that is, God, distributes his benefits both to the Greeks and to the Barbarians; and to them who are predestinated from among them, and are in his own time called, faithful, and elect,” (Ibid. 50:7, p. 702, 703.).

o   He comments on Jeremiah 1:5, 7, (Do not say, I am a child; before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee, etc.,) by saying this, “this prophecy intimates unto us, that those who before the foundation of the world are known by God unto faith; THAT IS, ARE APPOINTED BY HIM TO FAITH, are now babes, because of the will of God lately fulfilled, as we are new-born unto vocation and salvation,” (Paedadog. 50:1, c. 7, p. 111.)

·         Origen (230 CE)

o   “Upon casting lots the inheritance is distributed to the people of God, and the lot moved, not by chance, but according to what is predestinated by God,” (In Josuam Homil. 23, fol. 173, H.).

o   “…but by the goodness and love of God to man, and through wondrous and divine grace, the knowledge of God comes to them who were before comprehended in the foreknowledge of God; or, according to the version of Gelenius, who to this were predestinated,” (Contra cells. 1. 7, p. 361, 362.).

o   “All these things look this way, that the apostle may prove this; That if either Isaac or Jacob, for their merits, had been chosen to those things which they, being in the flesh sought after, and, by the works of the flesh, had deserved to be justified; then the grace of their merit might belong to the posterity of flesh and blood also, but now, since, their election does not arise from works, but from the purpose of God, from the will of him that calleth,” (In Rom.l. 7, fol. 195, G.).

o   “We are they “upon whom the ends of the ages have met, having ended their course.” We have been predestined by God, before the world was, (to arise) in the extreme end of the times.”(On the apparel of Women–Book II, Chapter 9)

·         Novatian (250 CE)

o   “For, says he,112 if he is said to be glorious in predestination, and predestination was before the foundation of the world, the order must be kept, and before him there will be, a large number of men appointed to glory,” (Novotian, de Trinitate, c. 24, p. 755.).

·         Athanasius (350 CE)

o   “The apostle, says he, in the first place, gives thanks to God for his piety, and signifies that faith in Christ was not a new thing, all, but that this was from eternity prepared and promised by God,” (Synops. Sacr. cript, vol. 3. p. 51.).

o   “Upon casting lots the inheritance is distributed to the people of God, and the lot moved, not by chance, but according to what is predestinated by God,” (In Josuam Homil. 23, fol. 173, H.).

o   “How therefore should he choose us before we were, unless, as he has said, we were before delineated in him? how verily, before men were created, should he predestinate us,” (Athanas. Contr. Arian. Orat. 3, p. 245, 246, vol. i.)

And on and on and on. I could list hundreds of more passages dealing with predestination, determination and other doctrines that we now consider to be part of Augustinian and Reformed theology.  Now, the Provisionist and others may want to nitpick some of these, but the point is that to claim that Augustine invented this doctrine whole cloth because of his prior life in Manicheism, is just flat out false. There is a very robust tradition in the ECFs prior to him that was working with these very same ideas. And if this doctrine existed prior to this, it existed in the Eastern Church, in the Western Church, in the 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd centuries prior to Augustine, then the parallel between a gnostic concept of determinism (which is actually far more a kind of materialistic fatalism rather than a divine determinism) and that of Augustinianism and later Calvinism is a trivial parallel at best with no real substantive impact or connection between the two.

As an aside, I find arguments from the early church to be problematic in another sense as well – they are often super over-selected. What I mean by that is that we like finding our view in the early church, but we also have no problem saying that the early church got things wrong, was underdeveloped, was mired in countless problems dealing with Platonism, and so forth. I’m curious if the Provisionist (almost exclusively Southern Baptists) are going to start baptizing their babies and believe in baptismal regeneration because those were almost the universal view of the church for several centuries. I highly doubt it.

**end update**

What this does is the same kind of slippery word play and absurd parellelomania that Jesus Mythicists play when they say that Jesus was a solar messiah just like Horace, Osiris, Mythra, etc. Jesus didn’t have a natural birth from a human father… but neither did Osiris, Mythra, Zoaraster, and so forth… therefore… they all have virgin births and are the same kind of solar messiah myths!!!!

Again, not even close. This equivocation flattens out concepts, trumps up extremely vague and superficial similarities, and simply intentionally and deceptively omits all the countless substantive conceptual, historical, and Biblical differences between the concepts in order the axe grind and ram through an absolutely absurd claim of parallel concepts.

Conclusion

Insofar as Provisionists continue to push through the “Calvinism is semi-Gnosticism” kind of rhetoric (on top of the "Calvin murdered Servetus nonsense), then they should not be surprised when serious minded and reasonable people, consider them to be ridiculous, dishonest, and about as reputable as Jesus Mythicists. 

If you want a better reputation outside of the Flowerpatch echo chamber, then the solution is simple:

Make better arguments.