Johannes Marck’s Marrow of Christian Theology, Didactic-Elenctic IV
James Dodson
CHAPTER IV
Of God
I. Various names are attributed to God in the Scriptures, although He has no need of them, being most distinct in Himself; nor are there any such names as fully and clearly express His most perfect nature, according to Gen. 32:29: “Wherefore dost thou ask after My name?” Judg. 13:18: “Wherefore askest thou after My name—
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—seeing it is wonderful?” Prov. 30:4: “What is His name, and what is His Son’s name, if thou canst tell?”
II. God is called from the Greek Θεός [God]; and this name does not signify primarily an office, but the nature of God, from Gal. 4:8: “Then, when ye knew not God, ye served τοῖς μὴ φύσει οὖσι Θεοῖς [those which by nature are not gods].” Col. 2:9: “For in Him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.” Ps. 90:2: “Before the mountains were brought forth, or Thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, Thou art God.” This must be held against the Socinians, who deny the divine nature to Christ and badly twist this point, because by a secondary notion, on account of a likeness of majesty, this name is sometimes transferred to magistrates and angels.
III. The names of God which are sometimes attributed to creatures are also attributed to God ἐμφατικῶς [emphatically], Exod. 3:6: “I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Deut. 10:17: “Jehovah your God is God of gods, and Lord of lords, a great God, mighty and terrible.” The principal Greek names are κύριος [Lord], derived from κῦρος [authority], and Θεός [God], commonly derived from θέαμαι [to behold] or τίθημι [to set / appoint], because of the divine knowledge of all things, or creation.
IV. The Hebrew names are commonly stated as ten. But that number is not fixed, since the singular אֱלוֹהַּ [Eloah / God] and the plural אֱלֹהִים [Elohim / God] are sometimes set down as two; and צְבָאוֹת [hosts], which denotes the heavenly armies and is referred to those subject to God, is sometimes taken as His proper name.
V. Moreover, God is called אֵל [El] from strength; אֱלֹהִים [Elohim], either from worship or from swearing, which name is most often read with a plural termination;—
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—שַׁדַּי [Shaddai] from all-sufficiency;עֶלְיוֹן [Elyon] from the height of perfections, dominion, and habitation; אֲדֹנָי [Adonai] from the sustaining of all; יְהוָה [Jehovah] from the highest fittingness, if not from the most perfect essence and immutable eternity.
VI. The chief of all is the tetragrammaton name יְהוָה [Jehovah], which was not unknown to the fathers before Moses, Gen. 4:1: “I have gotten a man from Jehovah”; Gen. 15:2: “Lord Jehovah, what wilt Thou give me?”; Gen. 28:13: “I am Jehovah, the God of Abraham thy father,” etc. Yet God did not then demonstrate the truth of this name by the infallible performance of the greatest promises so much as He did afterwards in bringing the people out of Egypt. This is what is meant by Exod. 6:2: “I appeared unto Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as God Almighty, but by My name Jehovah I was not known to them,” etc.
This name certainly could be pronounced, Num. 6:24: “Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee,” etc., although it cannot conveniently be expressed by Greek letters. We also think it better today to read “Jehovah” than “Adonai,” so that one name may be distinguished from the other in hearing, and that the letters may be retained—whether the points are now foreign, which has not yet been demonstrated, or genuine, which seems to be evident also from the compounds Jehonathan, Jehojadah, Jehoshaphat, etc.
VII. This name denotes the most simple, independent, and eternal essence of God, and also the immutable constancy of His words. Rev. 1:8: “The Lord, who is, and who was, and who is to come,” etc., compared with Exod. 6:2. And it is so proper to God alone that it is never attributed by analogy to creatures; which is evident both from its signification and from—
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—express passages: Isa. 42:8, “I am Jehovah; that is My name; and My glory will I not give to another”; Hos. 12:5, “Jehovah God of hosts; Jehovah is His memorial”; Ps. 83:18, “That they may know that Thou, whose name alone is Jehovah,” etc.
The Socinians deny this because they deny the deity of Christ, and they object:
1. That the same name is attributed to angels, Gen. 18:1; Judg. 13:19; Zech. 3:2, etc.
Reply: It is attributed only to one uncreated Angel, namely Christ.
2. That the altar and Jerusalem are so called, Exod. 17:15: “And Moses built an altar, and called the name of it Jehovah-Nissi”; Ezek. 48:35: “And the name of the city from that day shall be, Jehovah is there.”
Reply: These are only denominated from Jehovah, to whom they were sacred and who dwelt there.
3. That the Ark of the Covenant was so called, Num. 10:35–36: “When the ark set forward, Moses said, Rise up, Jehovah,” etc.
Reply: Rather, it is God Himself who is invoked at the ark.
VIII. All superstition in this name must be avoided; nor therefore must any hidden power be attributed to its writing or pronunciation. From this, it seems, τὸ ὄνομα [the Name] among the Gentiles flowed.
IX. Other divine names are attributed:
1. By catachresis, to idols, the devil, and the belly: 1 Cor. 8:5: καὶ γάρ, εἴπερ εἰσὶ λεγόμενοι Θεοί, εἴτε ἐν οὐρανῷ εἴτε ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, ὥσπερ εἰσὶ Θεοὶ πολλοὶ καὶ κύριοι πολλοί [for though there be those that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, as there are gods many and lords many]; 2 Cor. 4:4: ἐν οἷς ὁ Θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου ἐτύφλωσε τὰ νοήματα τῶν ἀπίστων [in whom the god of this age hath blinded the minds of unbelievers]; Phil. 3:19: “whose end is destruction, ὧν ὁ Θεὸς ἡ κοιλία [whose god is the belly],” etc.
2. By analogy, to magistrates and angels: Ps. 82:6, “I have said, Ye are gods”; Ps. 97:7, “Worship Him, all ye gods,” etc. Nor even today are they to be deprived of this name.
3. Univocally—
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—even the very name Jehovah is attributed to the individual divine Persons, when the subsistences are set down: either for the Father, 1 Cor. 12:6: ὁ δὲ αὐτός ἐστι Θεὸς ὁ ἐνεργῶν τὰ πάντα ἐν πᾶσι [but it is the same God who worketh all things in all]; or for the Son, 1 Tim. 3:16: Θεὸς ἐφανερώθη ἐν σαρκί [God was manifested in the flesh]; or for the Holy Ghost, Acts 5:3–4, “thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God,” etc.
X. That God exists, the irrefragable dictate of one’s own conscience teaches all men. And many arguments are given in nature: from the dependence of all individual things; from the elegant order of all things; from their most excellent connection; from stable change; from extraordinary events; from the marvelous direction of chance events, etc. Indeed, in Scripture also God has manifested Himself most clearly for the conviction of all.
XI. God cannot be perfectly defined, as is required according to the rules of logicians, because He is not composed of parts; nor does He admit a predicamental genus and specific difference. Nor can we ever fully comprehend God here, since He is infinite and we are finite. Job 11:7: “Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?” Ps. 139:6: “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it.” Prov. 30:2–3: “Surely I am more brutish than any man, and have not the understanding of a man,” etc. 1 Tim. 6:16: “dwelling in light inaccessible, whom no man hath seen, nor can see,” etc. Both of these things must be held against Vorstius and the Socinians.
XII. Of the various descriptions of God, we prefer those in which the Trinity of Persons or the essential perfections are contained, because what is required is not a description of deity in the abstract, but of God; nor is He rightly known here without the Trinity. Thus God is: an infinite Spirit of perfection, three in Persons.
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XIII. Nature, or essence, is deservedly attributed to God according to Scripture, 2 Pet. 1:4: “that by these ye might become partakers of the divine φύσεως [nature]”; Prov. 8:14: “counsel is Mine, תּוּשִׁיָּה [substance / sound wisdom] and essence”; and elsewhere it mentions τὸ θεῖον [the divine], Acts 17:29; θειότης [divinity], Rom. 1:20; and θεότης [Godhead], Col. 2:9. This nature we express rather by the name “Spirit” than by the more common name “being” or “substance.”
XIV. God, moreover, is altogether Spirit, as it is said in John 4:24: πνεῦμα ὁ Θεός [God is Spirit]. Hence He is incorporeal, Acts 17:29: γένος οὖν ὑπάρχοντες τοῦ Θεοῦ, οὐκ ὀφείλομεν νομίζειν χρυσῷ ἢ ἀργύρῳ ἢ λίθῳ [being therefore the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone], etc.; and invisible, 1 Tim. 1:17: “unto the King eternal, incorruptible, ἀοράτῳ [invisible],” etc.; and unsearchable, Isa. 40:18: “To whom then will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto Him?” He is also furnished with intellect and will.
Against this the Anthropomorphites maintain their opinion, and object:
1. Human members are everywhere attributed to God.
Reply: These must be expounded ἀνθρωποπαθῶς [anthropopathically], concerning the perfections and actions of those members.
2. Corporeal man was made in the image of God.
Reply: That image does not consist in the form of the members, but in the united nature and gifts of the soul.
3. God has often been seen, and is to be seen by the godly: Job 19:26, “from my flesh I shall see God”; 1 John 3:2, “for we shall see Him as He is,” etc.
Reply: The vision of God is either mental or imaginative; or it is the vision of a body assumed by God for a time; or of God incarnate, that is, of Christ Θεανθρώπου [the God-man], concerning whom the two cited passages speak.
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XV. Therefore the images of the triune God are wrongly adored and defended by the Papists, since His spiritual and infinite nature does not admit them, and Scripture detests them, Rom. 1:23–24: “And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things; therefore God also gave them up to lusts,” etc.; and severely forbids them, Deut. 4:15–16: “Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves, for ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that Jehovah your God spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire; lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the likeness of any figure,” etc.
Objection 1. Angels can be painted.
Reply: Not except emblematically; and these are ministers.
Objection 2. Man, who is the image of God, can be painted.
Reply: Yet not insofar as he has the image of God; and he again is finite.
Objection 3. God often appeared in visible form.
Reply: Not so that He might be painted, but that He might manifest His presence and grace. Nor was the divine essence then seen, nor is that painted even when the history is painted.
XVI. Since God is Spirit, He is:
1. True substance; therefore not mere thought, which the Scriptures formally distinguish from God: Ps. 92:5, “Thy thoughts are very deep”; Isa. 55:8, “For My thoughts are not your thoughts,” etc. Thought, as an action, must be wholly distinguished from the agent. Yet we must grant that thought, just as the other attributes and immanent actions, does not really differ in God Himself from His essence.
2. Living substance: John 5:26, “As the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself”; Matt. 16:16,—
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—“Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” etc. Thus He is distinguished from dead idols, as perpetually existing and active from Himself.
3. Substance furnished with faculty:
α. Of intellect: Ps. 139:2, “Thou knowest my sitting down and my rising up; Thou understandest my thought afar off”; Ps. 147:5, “His understanding is infinite,” etc.
β. Of will: Ps. 115:3, “But our God is in the heavens; He hath done whatsoever He pleased”; Isa. 46:10, “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure,” etc. This will is commonly distributed, with respect to its object, into natural and revealed, and into the will of good pleasure and the will of sign.
γ. Of power to work outwardly, which is not passive, but active: Isa. 1:24, “the Lord Jehovah of hosts, the Mighty One of Israel”; Eph. 1:19: καὶ τί τὸ ὑπερβάλλον μέγεθος τῆς δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ εἰς ἡμᾶς τοὺς πιστεύοντας κατὰ τὴν ἐνέργειαν τοῦ κράτους τῆς ἰσχύος αὐτοῦ [and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of the might of His strength].
XVII. After the nature of God, His attributes must be considered. These are perfections by which He offers Himself to be known by us weak men, and by which He is especially distinguished from creatures. These are not distinguished really, either among themselves or from God Himself, because of God’s independence, simplicity, and immutability; but only with respect to objects, effects, and our mode of conceiving. Commonly they call this a distinction of reasoned reason, which is said to have some foundation in the thing.
XVIII. All the attributes together are comprehended under the name of infinity or supreme perfection. Scripture teaches this by naming all-sufficiency, Gen. 17:1; blessedness, 1 Tim. 6:15; greatness, Ps. 145:3; incomparability, Isa. 40:25; and incomprehensibility, Job—
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—11:7–9: “Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? It is as high as heaven; what canst thou do? deeper than hell; what canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader than the sea,” etc. Nor is this overthrown by God’s singularity, because He possesses all perfections not formally, but eminently.
XIX. These attributes are divided into proper and metaphorical, negative and positive, absolute and relative, internal and external, and especially into communicable and incommunicable. The contrary of the latter belongs to all creatures; but a certain obscure analogy of the former is found in creatures, and therefore these are proposed to us for imitation. This communication also agrees with the phrase of Scripture, which attributes the image of God to man, Gen. 1:26, and communion of the divine nature, 2 Pet. 1:4, etc.; while it is easily agreed by all that the attributes of God are not properly communicated to creatures.
XX. The incommunicable attributes are chiefly five: independence, simplicity, immutability, eternity, and immensity. Independence is defined as that perfection of God by which, being sufficient to Himself, He is the supreme cause of all things outside Himself. This attribute is proved as to its first member from Gen. 17:1: “I am God All-sufficient”; Acts 17:25: “Neither is He worshipped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, seeing He gives to all life and breath and all things”; Isa. 41:4: “I Jehovah, the first,” etc. It is proved as to the other member from Neh. 9:6: “Thou, even Thou, art Jehovah alone; Thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, and all their host, the earth and all things that are therein,” etc.; Rom. 11:36: “For of Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things,”—
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—etc. Although this independence is a positive perfection in God, yet He is not very conveniently said to be positively “from Himself,” since in this way He would seem most absurdly to be made, in some respect, the cause of Himself.
XXI. God is independent both in existence and in essence, with His faculties: of intellect, which therefore is not instructed from elsewhere; of will, in which there is no antecedent and conditioned will opposed to a consequent and absolute will; and finally of power. Hence this power is inexhaustible, irresistible, and extended to all things: Jer. 32:17, “There is nothing too hard for Thee”; Matt. 19:26, “with God all things are possible,” etc. It is divided both into actual power, which He exercises in various ways, Ps. 115:3, “He hath done whatsoever He pleased,” etc.; and absolute power, by which He can do things which never come to pass, Matt. 3:9, “I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham”; Matt. 26:53, “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He shall presently give Me more than twelve legions of angels?” This is so even antecedently to every decree of His.
XXII. Nevertheless, it must be said that, notwithstanding omnipotence, God cannot do:
1. Things which are contrary to His eternal counsel, Isa. 46:10: “My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure,” etc.
2. Things which are repugnant to His own perfections: 2 Tim. 2:13, ἀρνήσασθαι ἑαυτὸν οὐ δύναται [He cannot deny Himself], such as to lie and deceive, Heb. 6:18: ἀδύνατον ψεύσασθαι Θεόν [it is impossible for God to lie]; Titus 1:2: ὁ ἀψευδὴς Θεός [God, who cannot lie].
3. Things which posit the finitude of the creature, such as the eternity and infinity of the world.
4. Whatever involves true contradiction, because one of these always destroys—
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—the other, such as that a thing should both be done and not done at the same time. Yet in all this we place no true limits upon divine power, because these are not true and real objects or effects.
XXIII. Simplicity, positively called unity, is the most perfect unity of the divine essence and attributes, excluding every real composition. That God is one in essence is clear from Deut. 6:4: “Hear, O Israel: Jehovah our God is one Jehovah”; Eph. 4:6: “one God and Father of all”; 1 Tim. 2:5: “For there is one God,” etc.; and from other places which deny many gods, Isa. 45:6: “I am Jehovah, וְאֵין עוֹד [and there is none else], and there is no more”; John 17:3: “that they might know Thee, τὸν μόνον ἀληθινὸν Θεόν [the only true God],” etc.
Nor would He be supremely perfect or powerful, nor would all things be governed so constantly or tend to one end, unless He were one. Therefore, if the Gentiles posited many gods, their error arose from the multitude of names, attributes, and works; yet this did not prevent them from recognizing one supreme, and therefore true, God. And when we say there are multiple Persons, we believe from God’s revelation that these share in one single essence in an ineffable manner.
XXIV. Furthermore, in this one essence there is no real composition, whether physical, logical, or metaphysical. This is clear against the Socinians and Vorstius from the independence, supreme perfection, and immutability of God. Nor is this question merely metaphysical, as the Arminians say, since Scripture contains all these attributes of God and attributes perfections to God in the abstract: 1 John 1:5: ὁ Θεὸς φῶς ἐστι [God is light]; 1 John 4:8: ὁ Θεὸς ἀγάπη ἐστί [God is love], etc.
Objection 1. The Persons are distinguished from the essence.
Reply: Not as things, but as modes of subsisting, not composing the infinite essence, but modifying it.
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Objection 2. There are distinct decrees in God.
Reply: They are many only with respect to objects and effects, not with respect to the act of the divine will.
Objection 3. There are multiple distinct attributes in God.
Reply: In God they are nothing but one supreme perfection, which, because of our weakness, is conceived by us inadequately according to the variety of objects and effects, and thus is defined as it were by parts.
XXV. From this simplicity of God it follows that no part of the divine essence is given to any creatures, not even to man, although the image of God is attributed to him. It also follows that God cannot be compounded with many creatures so as to constitute one substance, such as no composition exists even in the person of the Θεανθρώπου [God-man].
XXVI. The immutability of God is the most perfect constancy of God, by which He is free from every actual and possible change. Of this we read in Mal. 3:6: “For I Jehovah change not”; Jas. 1:17: “with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning,” etc. This flows from simplicity; and, certainly, because of supreme perfection He cannot be changed either for the better or the worse, either by Himself or by anyone else. This immutability pertains to God’s existence, to His essence, always the same, Ps. 102:27: “But Thou art the same,” etc.; to His intellect, knowing all things from eternity; to His will; and even to His revealed Word. Hence all human affections must be removed far from God. When they are attributed to God anthropopathically, they must be expounded οἰκονομικῶς [economically / by accommodation] concerning the effects.
XXVII.—
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XXVII. Immensity, which includes omnipresence in itself, is the perfection of God by which, contained by no measure of created things, nor by the creatures themselves, He is present to all creatures and exceeds their limits. Omnipresence is not only of knowledge or operations, but also of the essence knowing and operating all things, as is clear from Jer. 23:23–24: “Am I a God at hand, saith Jehovah, and not a God afar off? Can any hide himself in secret places that I shall not see him, saith Jehovah? Do not I fill heaven and earth, saith Jehovah?” Ps. 139:7–9: “Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit? and whither shall I flee from Thy face? If I ascend up into heaven, Thou art there; if I make my bed in hell, behold, Thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold me.” Acts 17:27: καίτοιγε οὐ μακρὰν ἀπὸ ἑνὸς ἑκάστου ἡμῶν ὑπάρχοντα [though He is not far from every one of us].
Yet the Socinians deny this, and object:
1. That God is said to be in heaven, Matt. 6:9.
Reply: This is as upon a throne; but at the same time He is upon earth as upon a footstool, Isa. 66:1: “Heaven is My throne, and earth is My footstool.”
2. That God is in Christ, and likewise among the godly and the blessed.
Reply: The special modes of presence, by personal union, grace, and glory, do not exclude the general presence of essence.
3. That God would thus be mixed with created things and polluted by them.
Reply: He remains most distinct, and, as the most holy Spirit, can never be contaminated.
XXVIII. God is by no means coextended with things, because He is the most simple Spirit; nor can extended things mutually penetrate one another. Therefore—
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—the essential omnipresence of God must not be presented as if it called God extended, as modern philosophers imagine. These men also most wrongly deny that essential presence of God, referring it only to operations, because we can conceive the manner of the thing with difficulty. Yet from Scripture and reason it is clear that God cannot operate where the essence operating is not itself present.
Not badly did the scholastics observe that bodies which are touched are in a place circumscriptively; spirits, which are here and not elsewhere without contact, are in a place definitively; but God, who does not merely pass through all things, but penetrates them, is in a place repletively.
XXIX. No creature except God is omnipresent; still less any body, which, having parts outside parts, cannot be whole everywhere in the place of each individual part, as would be necessary for omnipresence. Hence the example of the world, which is objected, is foreign to the matter, since it is one by aggregation, and with respect to one part is here, while with respect to another part it is elsewhere.
XXX. By immensity God also coexists with every possible space, which, because it does not actually exist, is called imaginary; thus He is not contained by the limits of the created world. 1 Kings 8:27: “Behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain Thee,” etc. Whether, then, God is said to be outside the world in Himself, or relatively in imaginary space, the matter comes to the same thing. For those beat the air who fight over whether imaginary spaces truly exist outside, since the very name teaches that these have no actual existence.
XXXI. Eternity also belongs to God, most distinct from every age and time; by which—
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—being without all beginning, ending, and succession, He exists continually. This is attributed to God in Isa. 40:28, “the God of the age,” or eternity; Rom. 16:26: κατ᾽ ἐπιταγὴν τοῦ αἰωνίου Θεοῦ [according to the commandment of the eternal God], etc. And every beginning is removed from Him: Ps. 90:2, “Before the mountains were brought forth, and before Thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even from age to age Thou art God”; Deut. 33:27: אֱלֹהֵי קֶדֶם [the God of antiquity / the eternal God], etc. So also every end is removed: Ps. 102:12, “But Thou, Jehovah, shalt remain forever,” etc.; 1 Tim. 1:17: τῷ δὲ βασιλεῖ τῶν αἰώνων [now to the King of the ages], etc.
XXXII. Against the Socinians we also prove that no succession belongs to God: because with Him a thousand years and one day do not differ, 2 Pet. 3:8; because He remains immutably the same, Ps. 102:26–27, “They shall perish, but Thou shalt endure,” etc., “Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not be consumed”; and because succession is a continual passage from an end to a new beginning.
Objection 1. Differences of times are attributed to God, Rev. 1:4: ὁ ὢν καὶ ὁ ἦν καὶ ὁ ἐρχόμενος [who is, and who was, and who is to come].
Reply: This is by condescension to our capacity, insofar as He coexists with the differences of times by eternity.
Objection 2. He cannot coexist with successive moments without succession.
Reply: This is false, as is shown by the likeness of the point and circumference in a circle.
Objection 3. The moments of time are confused by God’s coexistence.
Reply: By no means; for individual moments coexist with divine eternity inadequately.
XXXIII. Eternity must be vindicated to God alone, since time is concreated with things. Nor could God have created anything from eternity, because to be created and to be eternal imply a contradiction. The reason of eternal generation is different, because by this no new essence is produced.
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XXXIV. The communicable attributes, distinguished from the faculties, are chiefly three: knowledge, which regards the intellect; goodness and justice, which regard the will. By knowledge or wisdom here we do not understand personal wisdom, which is the Son of God, Prov. 8:1, “Doth not Wisdom cry?” etc.; Luke 11:49: διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ἡ σοφία τοῦ Θεοῦ εἶπεν [therefore also the wisdom of God said], etc.; but attributive wisdom, concerning which 1 Sam. 2:3 says, “Jehovah is a God of knowledge”; Ps. 147:5, “His understanding is infinite”; Rom. 11:33: ὦ βάθος καὶ σοφίας καὶ γνώσεως Θεοῦ [O the depth both of the wisdom and knowledge of God]. This is defined as that perfection of God whereby, by one eternal act, He most perfectly knows all things in Himself.
XXXV. Thus we note that God knows:
1. By a most simple act, since His intellect is most perfect and always the same, while discursive reasoning implies ignorance and acquired knowledge.
2. From eternity; therefore Acts 15:18: γνωστὰ ἀπ᾽ αἰῶνός ἐστι τῷ Θεῷ πάντα τὰ ἔργα αὐτοῦ [known unto God from eternity are all His works]. Although, because of signs given to men, God is said anthropopathically to know something in time: Gen. 22:12, “Now I know that thou fearest God,” etc.
3. From Himself, since He is independent, and all things exist by His will; compare Isa. 40:13–14: “Who hath directed the Spirit of Jehovah? or who, being His counsellor, hath instructed Him? With whom took He counsel, and who instructed Him, and taught Him in the path of judgment, and taught Him knowledge, and showed to Him the way of understanding?”
4. Most perfectly, that is, intimately, infallibly, adequately, immutably, and most presently; compare Heb. 4:13: “Neither is there any creature invisible before Him, but πάντα δὲ γυμνὰ καὶ τετραχηλισμένα τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς αὐτοῦ πρὸς ὃν ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος [all things are naked and opened unto His eyes, with whom we have to do].”
XXXVI. God knows all things—
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—John 21:17, “Lord, Thou knowest all things”; Heb. 4:13, “Neither is there any creature invisible before Him, but all things are naked,” etc.; 1 John 3:20, “God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things.” Among these are:
1. God Himself, Matt. 11:27, “No man knoweth the Son but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son,” etc.
2. Things merely possible, by His all-sufficiency.
3. All creatures, singular and universal, but these in their singulars without abstraction.
4. The greatest and the least things, Ps. 147:4, “He telleth the number of the stars; He calleth them all by their names”; Matt. 10:30, “Even the hairs of your head are all numbered.”
5. Good and evil things, Prov. 5:21, “For the ways of man are before the eyes of Jehovah, and He pondereth all his goings”; Prov. 15:3, “The eyes of Jehovah are in every place, beholding the evil and the good”; Ps. 69:5, “O God, Thou knowest my foolishness, and my sins are not hid from Thee,” since He is going to judge concerning these.
6. The thoughts of the heart, 1 Kings 8:39, “for Thou, even Thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men”; Acts 1:24: σὺ κύριε καρδιογνῶστα πάντων [Thou, Lord, knower of all hearts].
7. Future things also, free and contingent: Ps. 139:2–4, “Thou knowest my downsitting and mine uprising; Thou understandest my thought afar off,” etc.; “for there is not a word in my tongue, but, lo, O Jehovah, Thou knowest it altogether”; Isa. 41:22–23, “Let them bring them forth and show us what shall happen,” etc.; “show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods,” etc. Hence also He foretells these things.
Yet the most wicked Socinians deny the knowledge of these things, and object:
1. Vain expectation and repentance are attributed to God, Isa. 5:4; Gen. 6:6–7.
Reply: These must be understood ἀνθρωποπαθῶς [anthropopathically], concerning the unfitness of the event and concerning the change of God’s work.
2. There is no determinate—
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—truth of these things.
Reply: Not among men, or in secondary causes, but altogether with God.
3. Absolute necessity of things flows from this.
Reply: A necessity of consequence, but not of coercion, or anything intrinsic in the things.
XXXVII. The knowledge of God is either knowledge of vision, otherwise called free knowledge, which refers to those things which exist through the will of God; or knowledge of simple intelligence, otherwise called natural knowledge, which is concerned with God and merely possible things. Some wrongly deny this latter knowledge, because they wish all truth and goodness to flow from the divine will; but they do this wrongly and in vain, since God’s existence, His attributes, the goodness of various precepts, the essences of things, and all eternal truths do not in any way depend upon the indifferent choice of the divine will.
XXXVIII. The Jesuits and Arminians add middle knowledge, or conditioned knowledge, by which God knows future free and contingent things under a condition before the decree. But by this the creature becomes independent by its own action, and God becomes dependent in His knowledge; and either the thing is certainly future, in which case it will belong to the knowledge of vision; or there is an intrinsic necessity in things; or it is future doubtfully, in which case it cannot be known certainly by God and will belong to things merely possible; or it is not future.
XXXIX. They object:
1. Certain examples, namely, of David being delivered up by the Keilites, if he remained there, 1 Sam. 23:11–12; and of the Tyrians being converted, if the mighty works had been done among them, Matt. 11:21.
Reply: It was signified to David what the counsel of the Keilites was, and the necessity of departing, flowing from God’s decree; but—
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—the impenitence of the Jews whom the Saviour addressed is aggravated by comparison with another impossibility.
2. The knowledge of God extends to all things.
Reply: To those things which are knowable; such as these by no means are.
3. Divine decrees, as most wise, require beforehand the knowledge of the sufficiency of means.
Reply: The whole sufficiency of these means flows from the counsel itself.
4. Otherwise things would not remain free or contingent.
Reply: This is brought only from a false hypothesis, as if liberty and contingency consisted in indifference.
XL. The knowledge of God is not properly the cause of things, but His will is; although His knowledge also precedes things and cannot be deceived.
XLI. The goodness of God sometimes denotes His intrinsic perfection; sometimes His loveliness toward creatures, compare Ps. 4:6–7, “Lift Thou up the light of Thy countenance upon us, Jehovah; Thou hast put gladness in my heart,” etc.; Ps. 73:25–26, “Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee. My flesh and my heart faileth; God is the rock of my heart and my portion forever,” etc. But chiefly it denotes His benignity, whereby He presents Himself amiably to various creatures in various ways and degrees: 2 Chron. 30:18, “Jehovah, who is good, pardon,” etc.; Ps. 73:1, “Surely God is good to Israel, to such as are of a pure heart”; Matt. 19:17: οὐδεὶς ἀγαθός εἰ μὴ εἷς ὁ Θεός [none is good but one, that is, God].
To this belongs love—not the natural love among the divine Persons, John 3:35, “The Father loveth the Son,” etc., but voluntary love toward creatures, men, and especially the elect: Ps. 36:6–7, “Thou preservest man and beast, O Jehovah; how precious is Thy lovingkindness, O God”; Matt. 5:45, “He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and raineth on the just and on the unjust”; John 3—
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—16, “God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son,” etc. With respect to its various acts, this love is called either love of benevolence or love of complacency, so that the former precedes the latter from eternity no less than in time.
XLII. Grace also belongs here, which excludes the dignity of the creature. It is distinguished into grace given, 2 Pet. 3:18, “grow in grace,” etc.; and grace freely giving, or the favor of God, Rom. 3:24, “being justified freely τῇ αὐτοῦ χάριτι [by His grace]”; Rom. 4:4, “to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned κατὰ χάριν, ἀλλὰ κατὰ τὸ ὀφείλημα [according to grace, but according to debt],” etc. The Papists wrongly add “grace making one acceptable.” It is also internal or external, common or saving, prevenient, cooperating, or subsequent, etc.
Meanwhile the Jesuits and Arminians wrongly distinguish grace into sufficient grace, which is said to be wholly universal, and efficacious grace, which comes to the saved. For truly sufficient grace has no need of another supplement, and men naturally are excluded from every hope of salvation, Eph. 2:12: ἐλπίδα μὴ ἔχοντες καὶ ἄθεοι ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ [having no hope, and without God in the world]. Moreover, the threefold grace of election, redemption, and calling is altogether particular, all of which they wrongly make universal.
XLIII. Mercy, which is also to be referred to goodness, denotes God’s affection toward miserable creatures: Exod. 34:6, “Jehovah, Jehovah, God merciful and gracious,” רַחוּם וְחַנּוּן [merciful and gracious]; Luke 6:36, “Be ye therefore merciful, καθὼς καὶ ὁ πατὴρ ὑμῶν οἰκτίρμων ἐστί [as also your Father is merciful]”; Eph. 2:4, ὁ δὲ Θεὸς πλούσιος ὢν ἐν ἐλέει [but God, being rich in mercy], etc. This is often declared also by the likenesses of a shepherd, father, and mother. And this is in some way common even to the reprobate, but in saving efficacy—
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—it is proper to the elect, who are therefore called σκεύη ἐλέους [vessels of mercy], Rom. 9:23.
XLIV. Patience, or long-suffering, likewise a species of goodness, denotes the delay of just wrath: Exod. 34:6, “Jehovah, Jehovah,” etc., “long-suffering,”אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם [slow to anger], “and great in goodness and truth”; Rom. 2:4: ἢ τοῦ πλούτου τῆς χρηστότητος καὶ τῆς ἀνοχῆς καὶ τῆς μακροθυμίας καταφρονεῖς [or despisest thou the riches of His goodness and forbearance and long-suffering], etc. God demonstrated this not only under the Old Testament through μακροθυμίαν [long-suffering] toward sins in τῇ ἀνοχῇ τοῦ Θεοῦ [the forbearance of God], Rom. 3:25; but He also demonstrates it today for the conviction of the reprobate and the conversion of the elect.
XLV. Threefold justice is attributed to God: divine, dominical, and judicial. By divine justice is understood His natural holiness: Isa. 6:3, “Holy, holy, holy, Jehovah of hosts”; John 17:11, 25, “Holy Father,” etc.; “Righteous Father,” etc.
By dominical justice is meant the demonstration of that holiness in all His words and deeds. For God is infallibly truthful in His words, Rom. 3:4, “Let God be true”; Tit. 1:2: ὁ ἀψευδὴς Θεός [God who cannot lie]. He is also constant in His promises and, with respect to them, faithful: Neh. 9:8, “Thou hast performed Thy words, for Thou art righteous”; 1 Sam. 15:29, “The Eternity of Israel will not lie nor repent; for He is not a man, that He should repent”; Mal. 3:6, “I Jehovah change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed”; Heb. 6:17, “wherein God, willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise τὸ ἀμετάθετον τῆς βουλῆς αὐτοῦ [the immutability of His counsel], ἐμεσίτευσεν ὅρκῳ [confirmed it by an oath]”; 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, πιστός ἐστι καὶ δίκαιος [He is faithful and just] to forgive us our sins,” etc.
Therefore, if at any time His words seem not to have been fulfilled, they must be taken as conditional, from 1 Tim. 4:8: ἡ δὲ εὐσέβεια πρὸς—
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—πάντα ὠφέλιμος ἐστιν, ἐπαγγελίαν ἔχουσα ζωῆς τῆς νῦν καὶ τῆς μελλούσης [godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come]; Jer. 18:8, “If that nation turn from their evil, against which I have spoken, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them,” etc.
He is likewise blameless in His precepts, which, when well considered, we always find to be most equitable and most becoming. Finally, He is irreprehensible in all His works: Deut. 32:4, “The Rock, His work is perfect; for all His ways are judgment: a God of truth, and without iniquity; just and right is He,” etc.
XLVI. By judicial justice, moreover, God renders to each one his own in judgment, good to the good and evil to the evil. Gen. 18:25, “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” Ps. 11:7, “For Jehovah is righteous; He loveth righteousness,” etc.; 2 Thess. 1:6–7, “seeing it is a righteous thing with God ἀνταποδοῦναι τοῖς θλίβουσιν ὑμᾶς θλίψιν, καὶ ὑμῖν τοῖς θλιβομένοις ἄνεσιν μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν [to repay affliction to those who afflict you, and to you who are afflicted, rest with us],” etc.
Insofar as He repays good, this is called remunerative justice. Remuneration is either evangelical, which belongs to believers on account of Christ’s merit: 2 Tim. 4:8, λοιπόν, ἀπόκειται μοι ὁ τῆς δικαιοσύνης στέφανος, ὃν ἀποδώσει μοι ὁ Κύριος ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ, ὁ δίκαιος κριτής [henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me in that day], etc.; or legal, which belongs to one perfectly fulfilling the law. We judge that, with respect to this justice, no more than with respect to His unstained holiness and greatest goodness, it can be that God should deprive a plainly innocent and holy man of reward and afflict him with eternal punishments.
Some object:
1. God punishes children for the sins of parents, and the righteous with the wicked, Exod. 20:5; Ezek. 21:3.
Reply: Temporal evils are treated there, and men involved in common sin.
2. The man born blind had neither sinned, nor—
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—had his parents, John 9:3.
Reply: That means with some sin more grievous than others.
3. Adam’s posterity suffer his sin, and Christ’s merits are suffered for the elect.
Reply: Neither occurs without regard to sin, and therefore not to a plainly innocent person.
4. God’s right over creatures is most absolute.
Reply: Yet the exercise of it is limited by God’s own perfections.
XLVII. Insofar as God inflicts punishment upon the sinner, the same justice is called vindicatory, avenging, punishing, etc. And this is so natural to God that He cannot dismiss sin altogether unpunished, according to Exod. 34:7, נַקֵּה לֹא יְנַקֶּה [clearing, He will not clear / He will by no means clear], “and He will by no means hold the guilty innocent”; Ps. 5:4–6, “For Thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness; evil shall not dwell with Thee. The foolish shall not stand in Thy sight; Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. Thou shalt destroy them that speak leasing; Jehovah will abhor the bloody and deceitful man,” etc.; Hab. 1:13, “Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity,” etc.
This also accords with the holiness of God, Ps. 50:21, “These things hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself: I will reprove thee,” etc.; Josh. 24:19, “For He is a holy God; He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your transgression nor your sins,” etc.; and according to the effect in the punishment of His Son, Rom. 3:25–26: ὃν προέθετο ὁ Θεὸς ἱλαστήριον διὰ τῆς πίστεως ἐν τῷ αὐτοῦ αἵματι, εἰς ἔνδειξιν τῆς δικαιοσύνης αὐτοῦ, πάρεσιν ἁμαρτημάτων προγεγονότων [whom God set forth as a propitiation through faith in His blood, for a demonstration of His righteousness, because of the passing over of former sins], etc.; πρὸς ἔνδειξιν τῆς δικαιοσύνης αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ νῦν καιρῷ [for a demonstration of His righteousness at the present time], etc.
Hence it is also plain that punishment does not flow only from the eternal decree of the divine will, as some wish. But the Socinians very wrongly make punishment an effect of the changeable will of God, in no way necessary, and object:
1. The liberty of God’s actions.
Reply: That liberty does not consist—
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—in indifference; and this liberty can also be seen in the preceding creation and permission of the fall.
2. The infinite power of God.
Reply: That power does not extend to unfitting things.
3. The mercy and goodness of God.
Reply: That implies the mitigation or transfer of punishment, not its removal.
4. The absolute power of God, since even men can remit something of their own right.
Reply: The exercise of power must agree with the divine perfections; and judges cannot lawfully remit punishment.
5. God actually remits sins and does not delight in punishment.
Reply: He remits only on account of Christ’s satisfaction; nor does He delight in punishment in preference to remuneration, or in the punishment of a repentant sinner.
XLVIII. Since God greatly excels His creatures in all perfections, He therefore has over all things supreme, full, and independent right or power: Jer. 10:6–7, “Forasmuch as there is none like unto Thee, O Jehovah; Thou art great, and Thy name is great in might. Who would not fear Thee, O King of nations? for to Thee doth it appertain; forasmuch as among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their kingdoms, there is none like unto Thee.” Jer. 18:6, “Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in Mine hand, O house of Israel.” Dan. 4:35, “All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing; and He doeth according to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay His hand, or say unto Him, What doest Thou?” Isa. 45:9, “Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker, a potsherd with the potsherds of the earth; shall the clay say to the potter, What makest thou? or thy work, He hath no hands?” Matt. 20:15: οὐκ ἔξεστί μοι ποιῆσαι ὃ θέλω ἐν τοῖς ἐμοῖς [is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own?]; Rom. 9:18–19, 21, “Therefore hath He mercy on whom He will have mercy, and whom He will He hardeneth”—
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—“Nay but, O man, who art thou, ὁ ἀνταποκρινόμενος τῷ Θεῷ; μὴ ἐρεῖ τὸ πλάσμα τῷ πλάσαντι, τί με ἐποίησας οὕτως; οὐκ ἔχει ἐξουσίαν ὁ κεραμεὺς τοῦ πηλοῦ [who answerest against God? Shall the thing formed say to Him who formed it, Why hast Thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay?],” etc.
Yet this power is determined in its exercise, both by God’s own perfections, by which He cannot do or command contradictory things, and by the immutable counsel of His will. This determined right is usually called ordained right, as the former is called absolute right.