Heinrich Schmid · 41 of 78

§ 36. The Sacerdotal Office. · Part 2

Andr. Osiander gave occasion to the supplementing of the passive by the active obedience. The doctrine was first developed by Flacius (in his work, “Concerning Righteousness vs. Osiander,” 1552) in the following manner: “The justice of God, as revealed in the Law, demands of us, poor, unrighteous, disobedient men, two items of righteousness. The first is, that we render to God complete satisfaction for the transgression and sin already committed; the second, that we thenceforth be heartily and perfectly obedient to His Law if we wish to enter into life. If we do not thus accomplish this, it threatens us with eternal damnation. And therefore this essential justice of God includes us under sin and the wrath of God . . . . Now there are often two parts of this righteousness due to the Law: the former, the complete satisfaction of punishment for sin committed, for, since it is right and proper to punish a sinner, one part of righteousness is willingly to suffer the merited punishment; the other part is perfect obedience, which should then follow and be rendered. Therefore the righteousness of the obedience of Christ, which He rendered to the Law for us, consists in these two features, viz., in His suffering and in the perfection of His obedience to the commands of God.”

The FORM. CONC. (Sol. Dec., III, 14) states the doctrine thus: “Therefore the righteousness which, out of pure grace, is imputed before God to faith or believers, is the obedience, the suffering, and the resurrection of Christ, by which, for our sake, He made satisfaction to the Law and expiated our sins. For since Christ is not only man, but God and man in one undivided person by reason of His own person, He was no more subject to the Law than He was to suffering and death, as He was the Lord of the Law. For this reason, His obedience (not only that by which in His entire passion and death He obeyed the Father, but also that by which, for our sake, He voluntarily subjected Himself to the Law and fulfilled it by His obedience) is imputed to us for righteousness, so that because of the entire obedience which, for our sake, Christ rendered His Heavenly Father, both by doing and suffering, God forgives us our sins.” Cf. III, 57. Intimations of this doctrine occur, indeed, already in the writings of earlier theologians, even in those of Luther, but before the time of the FORM. CONC., the obedience of Christ was considered mainly with reference to His sufferings. Thus MEL. (Loc. c. Th., II, 212): “Since, therefore, men did not afford obedience, it was necessary either that they should perish as a punishment, or that another one pay the penalty or ransom; therefore by His wonderful and unerring counsel, the Son of God, by interceding for us, paid the ransom, and drew upon Himself the wrath which we ought to have borne; wherefore, God did not abate His Law without a compensation, but preserved His justice in demanding punishment. Christ therefore says, ‘I am not come to destroy but to fulfil the Law,’ namely, by undergoing punishment for the human race and by teaching and restoring the Law in believers.” And at the time, and even after the time, of Osiander, many divines contented themselves with thus stating it, and to the passive added a further obedience only in this sense, viz., that the obedience of Christ manifested itself not only in suffering, but also throughout His entire holy life. Thus GRH. states it (VII, 60), who, however, in other passages, expresses himself as favoring the active obedience in the sense of the FORM. CONC.): “It remains for us to inquire by what means Christ merited the righteousness that avails before God. We reply, from the Scriptures, that the entire obedience of Christ, the active as well as the passive, that of His life as well as that of His death, concur in procuring this merit. For, although in many passages of Scripture the work of redemption is ascribed to Christ’s death, and the shedding of His blood, yet this must be received by no means exclusively, as though by it the holy life of Christ were excluded from the work of redemption, but it must be regarded as occurring for the reason that nowhere does the fact that the Lord has loved and redeemed us, shine forth more clearly than in His passion, death, and wounds, as the devout old teachers say; and because the death of Christ is, as it were, the last line and completion, the τελος, the end and perfection of the entire obedience, as the apostle says, Phil. 2:8. That it is altogether impossible in this merit to separate the active from the passive obedience, is evident, because even in the death of Christ the voluntary obedience and most ardent love concur, of which the former respects the Heavenly Father, and the latter us men, John 10:18; Gal. 2:20.” Direct opposition to the distinction drawn by Osiander was first made among the Lutheran theologians by Parsimonius (1563), who soon, however, withdrew it. He said: “The Law binds to either obedience or punishment, not both at once. Therefore, because Christ endured the punishment for us, He thereby rendered obedience for Himself.” Also: “What He rendered, that we dare not render, and are under no obligation to do it. But we must render obedience to the Law. Christ, therefore, did not render obedience to the Law for us, but for Himself, that He might be an offering unspotted and acceptable to God.” (Arnold, “Kirchen und Ketzer Geschichte,” vol. ii, pt. xvi, ch. xxx, § 12.) On the part of the Reformed, the chief opposition to this doctrine came from John Piscator, in Herborn. His arguments are answered at length by Grh., vii, 70, sqq.: “The suffering of penalties alone is not the righteousness of the Law, for then it would follow that the condemned most perfectly fulfill the Law; since they endure the most exquisite punishments for their sins . . . . The passion of Christ would not have profited had it not been combined with most full and perfect obedience to the Law . . . . The active obedience alone would not have been sufficient, because punishment was to be inflicted for the sins of the human race; the passive obedience alone would not have been sufficient, because if the sins were to be expiated, perfect obedience to each and every precept of the Law was required, i.e., the passive obedience had to be that of one who had most fully met every demand of active obedience . . . . Rational creatures not yet fallen into sin, the Law places under either punishment or obedience. The holy angels it obliges only to obedience, but in no way to punishment. Adam, in the state of innocency, it obliges only to obedience, but not at the same time, except conditionally, to punishment. For, where there is no transgression, there is no punishment. But rational creatures that have fallen into sin, it obliges to both punishment and obedience: to obedience, so far as they are rational creatures; to punishment, because they have fallen into sin. Thus, since the Fall, Adam and all his posterity are under obligation at the same time both of punishment and of obedience, because the obligation to obedience is in no way abated by a fall, but on the other hand, a new obligation has entered, viz., that of the endurance of punishment for sin.”

For the history of the doctrine of the active obedience, see Fr. H. R. Frank: “The Theology of the Form. Conc.,” II, 1861. J. G. Thomasius: “The Person and Work of Christ,” Part III, Division 1, second edition. 1863.

[14] HOLL. 737): “By the passive obedience, Christ transferred to Himself the sins of the whole world (2 Cor. 5:31; Gal. 3:13), and besides this suffered the punishments due them, by shedding His most precious blood, and meeting for all sinners the most ignominous death (Is. 53:4; 1 Pet. 2:24; John 1:29; Rom. 4:25; Gal. 1:4; 1 Cor. 15:3; 1 Pet. 3:18; Heb. 10:12; Rom. 6:23; Heb. 9:28), in order that, to believers in Christ the Redeemer, sins might not be imputed for eternal punishment.” To the satisfactory sufferings of Christ, there are referred (QUEN. III, 253): “All the acts of Christ, from the first moment of conception to the three days of His atoning death; as, His lying hid for nine months in the womb of the Virgin, His being born in poverty, His living in constant misery, His bearing hunger, thirst and cold. For He bore all these things for us and our sake.” Nevertheless, the passive obedience is said to consist “especially of death, and the yielding up of the spirit.”

[15] The satisfaction which Christ has made is, therefore, a vicarious satisfaction. HOLL. (737): “To a vicarious penal satisfaction, (a) if it be formally regarded, there is required: 1. A surrogation, by which some one else is substituted in the place of a debtor, and there is a transfer of the crime, or an imputation of the charge made against another. 2. A payment of penalties, which the substituted bondsman or surety makes in the place of the debtor; (b) considered with regard to the end, the payment of the penalty, for obtaining the discharge of the debtor, occurs in such a way that he is declared free from the crime and penalty.” The attacks of the Socinians against the vicarious satisfaction are refuted by GRH. (VII, 1. xvii, c. ii, § 37, sq.), and QUEN. (De officio Christi, pars polemica, qu. 6). The chief objection: “The action of one cannot be the action of another; the fulfilment of the Law is an action of Christ; therefore the fulfilment of the Law cannot be our action,” HOLL. (734) refutes thus: “An action is considered either physically, as it is the motion of one acting, or morally, as it is good or evil. The action of one can be that of another by imputation, not physically, but morally.”

[The argument of GRH. is: 1. Christ is our mediator, 1 Tim. 2:5; Heb. 8:6; 9:15; 12:24. 2. Our redeemer, Ps. 111:9; Luke 1:68; 2:38; Rom. 3:24; 1 Cor. 1:30; Eph. 1:7; Col. 1:14; 1 Tim. 2:7; Heb. 9:12, 15; 1 Pet. 1:18; Rev. 5:9. 3. The ιλασμος, propitiation for our sins, 1 John 2:2; 4:10; Rom. 3:24, 25. 4. By Him we are reconciled to God, Is. 63:3; cf. Rev. 19:13; John 1:17; Rom. 5:10, 11; 2 Cor. 5:18, 19; Eph. 2:16; 5:2; Col. 1:20. 5. He gave His life a λυτρον και αντιλυτρον for us, Matth. 20:28; Mark 10:45; 1 Tim. 2:5, 6, the latter meaning properly an equivalent compensation; and hence the benefit acquired is said to be λυτρωσις and απολυτρωσις, Luke 1:68; Tit. 2:14; 1 Pet. 1:18; Heb. 9:15. 6. He was made sin for us, 2 Cor. 5:21; Rom. 8:3. 7. He became a curse for us, Gal. 3:13. 8. He took upon Himself our sins and their punishment, Ps. 69:4; Is. 43:24, 25; 53:4, 6, 8; John 1:29; 1 Pet. 2:24. Here belongs the scape-goat, Lev. 16:20, as a type of Christ, John 1:29. 9. He shed His blood for our sins, Matth. 26:28; 1 John 1:7; Heb. 9:13, 14. 10. He blotted out the indictment, Col. 2:14. 11. He freed us from the curse of the Law, Gal. 3:13; 4:5. 12. From the wrath of God, 1 Thess. 1:10; 13. From eternal condemnation, 1 Thess. 5:9, 11. 14. In Christ we are righteous and beloved, 2 Cor. 5:21.

The counter-arguments of the Socinians are then examined: e.g., Against (1) they urge, that Moses was also a mediator. This is conceded. But there is more in the antitype than in the type. The manner in which Christ is said to be mediator is especially taught in Scripture, 1 Tim. 2:4, 5, 6; Heb. 9:15. Against (2) that redemption means only simple liberation without an intervening price of satisfaction. It is conceded that the word redeem is so used in some passages, but not in those which refer to Christ as our Redeemer, 1 Cor. 6:20; 1 Pet. 1:18, 19; Gal. 3:13; Eph. 1:7; Tit. 2:14; Heb. 9:12, 15; Rev. 5:9. Against (4) that the reconciliation is not of men with God, but of men with themselves, i.e., of Gentiles with Jews, and of men with angels. It is conceded that in Eph. 2, the apostle is speaking of the antagonism between Jews and Greeks, and in Col. 1, of that between angels and men; but from this it does not follow, that there is no reference to the removal of the dissent between men and God by Christ’s satisfaction, for this is distinctly said, Eph. 2:16; therefore He reconciled the Gentiles not only to the Jews, but also to God Himself, vs. 13, 18, 19. So, according to Col. 1, angels are reconciled to men, because, through Christ, the human race is reconciled to God. That we are reconciled to God through Christ, Scripture clearly asserts; but from this, it neither can, nor should be inferred that God is not reconciled to us through Christ, but rather that the one follows from the other. As we could not be reconciled to God, unless God were reconciled to us, the Apostle says (Rom. 5:10): “When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son,” etc.

Among the general objections of the Socinians, the chief is that any satisfaction conflicts with the gratuitous remission of sins; as a creditor cannot be said to remit a debt gratuitously, for which a satisfaction is rendered. GRH. answers that there is no opposition, but only a subordination, Rom. 3:24: ‘Being justified freely by His grace’ (gratuitous remission) ‘through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus’ (satisfaction), Eph. 1:7: ‘In whom we have redemption through His blood’ (satisfaction), ‘the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace’ (gratuitous remission). As the grace of God does not destroy the justice of God, so gratuitous reemission does not annul the merit and satisfaction of Christ which the Law demands. Nor was God a mere creditor, but also a most just judge and avenger of sins; nor were sins mere debts, but they conflict with the immutable justice of God revealed in the Law. In short, the particle freely excludes our worth, our merits, our satisfaction; but in no way the satisfaction of Christ. The mercy of God remitting sins is gratuitous; but not so absolute as to exclude the merit of Christ.”]

[16] QUEN. (III, 246): “The form or formal mode of the satisfaction consists in the most exact and sufficient payment of all those things which we owed . . . . Indeed this very payment of the entire debt of another, freely undertaken by Christ, and imputed to Him in the divine judgment, was sufficient, not merely because accepted of God. For in this satisfaction God did not, out of liberality, accept anything that was not such in itself, neither, in demanding a punishment due us and rendered by a surety, did He abate anything; but in this satisfaction Christ bore everything that the rigor of His justice demanded, so that He endured even the very punishments of hell, although not in hell, nor eternally . . . . Therefore the satisfaction of Christ is most sufficient and complete by itself, or from its own infinite, intrinsic value, which value arises from the facts, (1) that the person making the satisfaction is infinite God; (2) that the human nature, from the personal union, has become participant of divine and infinite majesty, and therefore its passion and death are regarded and esteemed as of such infinite value and price as though they belonged to the divine nature. Acts 20:28.” If men have merited eternal punishment, and Christ suffered only for a short time, yet this was nevertheless still a sufficient atonement, inasmuch as the sufferings of Christ are of infinite value. HUTT. meets the objection of the Photinians (Loc. Com., 427): “That the curse of the Law was eternal death; but now, since Christ did not undergo eternal death, therefore He has not undergone or borne for us the curse of the Law,” by saying: “The reasoning deceives through the sophism of ‘non causa pro causa.’ For it is not true, that the merit of Christ is not of infinite value, for the reason that Christ met a death that is not eternal; for, as the sins of our disobedience are actually finite, yet in guilt are infinite, since they are committed against the infinite justice of God; so the obedience and death of Christ were indeed finite in act, so far as they were circumscribed by a period of fixed time, namely, the days of humiliation, but they are infinite with respect to merit, inasmuch as they proceed from an infinite person, namely, from the only begotten Son of God Himself. Secondly, it is not unconditionally true, that the curse of the Law is to be defined only by eternal death. For if this were true, the Apostle’s definition of the curse of the Law, by the declaration of Moses: ‘Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree,’ Deut. 21:23, would have been extremely inaccurate. Then, eternal death is defined not only by its perpetual continuance, or the enduring of the tortures of hell, but also by the feeling of the sorrows of hell, united with rejection or desertion by God; so that he who even but for a moment endures such sorrows, can be said to have experienced eternal death. Thus Christ, indeed, not for a moment, or a short space of time, but through the entire period of His humiliation, truly endured the feeling of those sorrows of hell, so that at length He was constrained to exclaim, ‘My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?’ But the reason that He did not suffer death in the latter manner is, that He himself, as an innocent man, by dying satisfied the Law.” HOLL. (742) remarks: “Christ endured a punishment equivalent to eternal punishment, inasmuch as He suffered the punishments of hell intensively as respects their power, weight, and substance, although not extensively, so far as their duration and the accidents pertaining to the subject’s suffering are concerned; He bore the extremity, but not eternity of tortures.”

[The students of the history of the doctrine of the “Active Obedience,” have occupied themselves too exclusively with polemical treatises. In practical works, its formulation is much earlier than 1553. It is distinctly taught in the Third Homily of the Church of England (Cranmer) of 1547, in the Articles for the Reformation of Cologne (Melanchton and Bucer) of 1543, and the Brandenburg-Nürnberg Articles of 1433. What is especially interesting is, that this earliest document was prepared by Andrew Osiander himself, with the assistance of Brentz. Its presentation is as follows:

“This Mediator, treated thus with God: First, He directed His entire life to the will of the Father; did for us what we were under obligation to do, and yet could not do; and fulfilled the Law and all righteousness for our good, Matt. 5:17; Gal. 4:4; 1 Cor. 1:30; Phil. 3:9” (Active). “Secondly, He took upon Himself all our sins, and bore and suffered all that was due us, John 1:29; Is. 53:4-6; Rom. 8:32;” Gal. 3:13 (Passive).

Nowhere, in the whole range of Lutheran theology, are these two forms of the obedience more sharply discriminated than in the above]

[17] QUEN. (III, 228): “The real object for which satisfaction was rendered is one thing; the personal object is another. I. The real object comprises (1) all sins whatever, original as well as actual, past as well as future, venial as well as mortal, yea, even the very sin against the Holy Ghost, Is. 53:4 sq.; Tit. 2:14; 1 John 1:7; Heb. 1:3; 1 John 2:2. (2) All the penalties of our sins, temporal as well as eternal, Is. 53:5; Gal. 3:13; Rom. 5:8, 9; Heb. 2:14, 15; 1 Cor. 15:14.”

On the real object, GRH. VI, 306: “1. Scripture everywhere speaks indefinitely when it treats of the satisfaction rendered for sins by Christ. John 1:29: ‘The sin of the world,’ i.e., sin understood universally, everything having the nature of sin. 2. Not only indefinitely but also universally, Is. 53:6; Rom. 3:12; Tit. 2:14; 1 John 1:7. 3. Species of actual sins are specified, Is. 53:6; Rom. 3:12; Heb. 9:14. 4. Christ made satisfaction for every sin which the Law accuses and execrates. But the Law accuses and execrates all sins, not only original, but also actual, Gal. 3:13; Deut. 27:5. 5. Had Christ made satisfaction only for original sin, so that it would be left us to make satisfaction for actual sins, only one part of the work of redemption would be left to Christ, while the other, and that, too, the greater part, would be transferred to men. For Christ’s satisfaction would be for but one sin, while men would have to render satisfaction for many sins. But Scripture ascribes the entire work of redemption to Christ, 1 Tim. 2:5; Is. 63:3; Heb. 10:14. Christ however made full satisfaction not only for actual sins, but also for the temporal and eternal punishments due our sins: 1. According to the nature of a perpetual relation, when the guilt is removed, the debt of punishment belonging to the guilt is also removed. But Christ took upon Himself our sins, Is. 53:6; John 1:29; 1 Pet. 2:24. Therefore, He also transferred to Himself the penalty due our sins, and consequently freed us from the debt of the penalty that was to be paid. 2. Scripture emphatically says that the punishment due our sins was imposed on Christ, Is. 53:5. 3. All punishments, temporal and eternal, corporeal and spiritual, are included under the name ‘curse,’ Gal. 3:13. One punishment of sin is the curse of the Law; but ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law.’ Another punishment of sin is the dominion of Satan; but Christ has delivered us from the dominion of Satan, Heb. 2:14. Another punishment of sin is the wrath of God; but Christ has delivered us from the wrath to come, 1 Thess. 1:10. Another punishment is death; but Christ has delivered us from death, Hos. 13:14. Another is hell and eternal damnation; but Christ has delivered us from hell and eternal damnation, Rom. 8:1. 4. God’s justice does not allow the same sin to be punished twice; and He has ‘bruised’ His most beloved Son for our offenses, Is. 53:4. Therefore He will not punish them in those who have become partakers of the satisfaction rendered by Christ. 5. If we had still to render satisfaction as to the penalties of sin, the satisfaction of Christ would not yet be perfect, the work of redemption would not yet be complete, all things would not yet be finished by Him. And yet He cried on the cross, ‘It is finished,’ from which Heb. 10:14 infers, etc. Had He made satisfaction for original sin alone, or for guilt alone, it would be better called ημιλυτρωσις than απολυτρωσις.

That, by faith, men become partakers of the most perfect satisfaction rendered by Christ, we prove by the following arguments:

1. Scripture describes our reconciliation with God to be such that God no longer remembers our sins, Jer. 31:34, but casts them behind our backs, Is. 38:17, blots them out like a cloud, Is. 44:22, casts them into the depths of the sea, Mic. 7:19, does not impute, but covers them, Ps. 32:1. Therefore He does not hold the reconciled to the reckoning, or exact of them punishments. For were God still to punish, He would still impute; were He to avenge, He would still remember; were He to account, He could not keep covered; were He to examine, He could not cast away; were He to inspect, He could not blot out.

2. The complete forgiveness of sins is inconsistent with a debt of satisfaction yet to be rendered for the punishment. That for which a satisfaction is still exacted is not yet completely forgiven. No one would say that a creditor who still demands a satisfaction, had forgiven a debtor. When all the debt is forgiven, the obligation to pay even the least part is removed, etc.

The contrary doctrines are the various opinions of the Scholastics and Papists: (a) That “we can make satisfaction for our guilt;” (b) that while “we cannot make satisfaction for our guilt, we can for the penalty;” (c) that “eternal punishment is, by the power of the keys, commuted to temporal punishment, so as to bring it within our ability;” (d) that “while eternal guilt and punishment are remitted, the obligation to some temporal punishment remains.” Thus Bonaventura: “In sinning, the sinner binds himself to eternal punishment. Divine mercy, in justifying, remits all the guilt and subjection to eternal punishment. But since mercy cannot prejudice justice, whose office it is to punish what is wicked, it releases in such a way that he remains under subjection to only a relatively small amount of temporal punishment.”

In the controversy, the very practical question arose as to how then we are to regard the temporal afflictions of the justified. These, the Papists argued, were a fulfilment of the obligation of punishment, and thus satisfactions. The Lutherans, especially CHEMNITZ in his Examen, “De Satifactione,” maintained that, properly speaking, they were not punishments, but chastisements. “What before forgiveness were punishments of sinners, after forgiveness became the contests and exercises of the justified” (Chrysostom in GERHARD). GERH. (VI, 319): “The former are indications, testifying that the person afflicted is under the wrath of God; the latter proceed not from an enraged, but from a propitious God, Lam. 3:33. The former are testimonies, aye, beginnings of eternal punishment; the latter look towards the reformation and salvation of the godly. Where there is remission of sins, there punishment properly so called cannot occur; for what else if remission of sins, but forgiveness from punishment?”

II. (QUEN., III, 238): “The personal object comprises (not angels, but) each and every sinful man, without any exception whatever. For He suffered and died for all, according to the serious and sincere good pleasure and kind intention of Himself and God the Father, according to which He truly wills the salvation of each and every soul, even of those who fail of salvation; not κατα δοξαν (in appearance), but κατ αληθειαν (in truth, i.e., not in imagination or conjecture, but in very deed, and most truly, Is. 53:6; Matt. 20:28; 2 Cor. 5:14, 15; Heb. 2:9; 1 Tim. 2:6; John 1:29; 1 John 2:1, 2; Rom. 14:15; 1 Cor. 8:11; Heb. 6:4-6; 2 Pet. 2:1.”

On the personal object:

GRH., IV, 178: “If the reprobate are condemned because they do not believe in the Son of God, it follows that to them also the passion and death of Christ pertain. For, otherwise, they could not be condemned for their contempt of that which, according to the divine decree, does not pertain to them. The former is distinctly affirmed, John 3:18, 36; 16:9. If Christ had not made satisfaction for the sins of unbelievers, it follows that they are condemned for the very reason that they are unwilling to believe that that pertains to them, which in truth, and according to God’s immutable decree, does not pertain to them. I add also this argument: To whomsoever God offers benefits acquired by the passion and death of Christ, for them also Christ has died. For far be it from us to ascribe to God such dissembling as though by His Word, He would call the unbelieving to repentance and the kingdom of Christ, whom nevertheless He would exclude therefrom by an absolute decree. But both Scripture and experience testify that God has offered and still is offering His Word and Sacraments to some reprobate and condemned, and, in these means, also the blessings acquired by the passion and death of Christ.”

He next shows how the Calvinists have attached another sense to the Scholastic axiom, which they have adopted: “Christ died sufficiently, but not efficiently for all.” The Scholastics meant by this, that Christ potentially saved all, and that the reason that all do not partake of His grace must be found in their own guilt, in not accepting Him by faith. The Calvinists, on the other hand, understand by it that Christ’s death would not be without the power to expiate the sins of all, if it had been destined by God for this end, but that such was not His purpose.

“The former refer the cause of the inefficiency to the men themselves; by the latter, it is referred to the decree of God.”

The chief arguments in opposition to the universality of the satisfaction are recounted:

1. “Christ says, that He lays down His life for His sheep, John 10:15; sanctifies Himself for those given Him of His Father, John 17:19; His blood is given for many, Matt. 26:28. Christ, therefore, has died only for the elect.” But (a) the force of such argument is: Christ died for His sheep. Therefore, for His sheep alone. He died for the elect; therefore, only for the elect. (b) The particular is included in its universal, viz., that Christ died for all; hence the universal ought not to be limited by the particular, but the particular extended by its universal. (c) The word “many” is frequently used in Scripture for all, Ps. 97:1; Dan. 12:2; Rom. 5:19. Hence the argument: “Christ died for many; and, therefore, not for all,” is invalid. (d) In these passages “many” must necessarily be understood of the whole multitude of men. This is shown by the opposition in the argument of Rom. 5:19. For all who were rendered sinners by Adam’s fall, the benefit of righteousness has been acquired. Cf. Is. 53:12 with v. 6; also Matt. 20:28, with 1 Tim. 2:6. (e) Scripture speaks in accordance with the double relation of Christ’s merit, it is universal, if considered apart from its application; but its application and actual enjoyment is, by man’s fault, rendered particular.