If it is asked why such a man is elect, and such a man is not elect, it is most true that we have no answer; this is God’s secret; we have nothing to do with it. But if the question is, why are there elect and non-elect, we have to deal with it and we can give an answer: it is to the manifestation of God. This is the end of all his counsels, and of all his operations. For some observations on Luther’s accepted aphorism ‘Quae supra nos, nihil ad nos,’ and upon ‘his apparent setting out of two Gods,’ one of which we have nothing to do with; and for the correct answer to Erasmus’ insidious question, ‘Does God deplore,’ etc., see notes t, v , and x, which follow.
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Religiosius. ‘By religious considerations.’ — The multitude might look into the entrance; priests might enter into the penetralia; but the multitude might not go in to explore. If they did, they were filled with terrors; appalling sights confounded them. Just so, and with still more fearful apprehensions of a religious nature, we are prohibited, says Luther, from attempting to penetrate the secret of God. But the question is, where does this secret begin? Luther says, ‘in the fact that some are touched by the law, and others are not.’
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Super omnem Deum praedicatum et cultum. Literally, ‘above all the proclaimed and worshipped God.’ I question the soundness of Luther’s interpretation of this text, and consequently of the argument which he draws from it — although the distinction which he labours to establish is, with some modification and amplification, the root of the answer to the objection. “Who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is an object of worship,” is the more correct rendering of the original text. The meaning seems to be that this Antichrist would both oppose himself to, and exalt himself above, every object of worship, both true and false — ‘every being that is called God, and every substance which is worshipped.’ It therefore has nothing to do with distinct views and considerations respecting the true God, but only marks the extravagant claims which this Antichrist would make, and which would be allowed by his votaries, as compared with the several objects of worship received in the world. — The word of God, however, does clearly recognise a distinction between God, regarded as the legislator, governor, and judge of his moral creation — or in any other relations which he may have been pleased to assume towards the whole, or certain parts, of that creation; and God, regarded as he is in himself, and as separated from such relations — also, between that will of His which he has revealed for our obedience (what may therefore be called his legislative will), and that free, infinite, and eternal will of His, from which this legislative will has emanated, and by which, in perfect consistency with all his assumed relations, and with that of legislator among the rest, he regulates his own conduct (what may therefore be called, by way of distinction, his personal will): in other words, between his commands and his mind. — God, who made the worlds, the sole Being, subsisted in his trinity of co-equal persons, infinite, and all-blessed, before he made them. Is it presumptuous to say why he made them? Has he not unequivocally told us? His end is, as it must be, seated in himself. (See Vaughan’s Calvinistic Clergy defended,, p. 64 73. 2d Ed.)
He will show himself — WHAT HE is — so far as infinite can be shown to finite, to certain moral and intelligent creatures, whom he will make capable of apprehending, adoring, and enjoying him, in their measure. Hence, the whole counsel, process, series, and results of creation, in which I include all that belongs to Creator and creature-ship. Hence the true distinction between the hidden and revealed God — which properly is no other than God the revealer and God the revealed. Creation in this wide extent is only God’s revealer; and having revealed much of him in reality, there is yet much at last in God which is not, and cannot be revealed. Thus, we see that this hidden God, or rather this absolute God (so-called because He is not circumscribed by relations, which relations, however, can only be such as He has seen fit to assume; and which he has seen fit to assume for the one great end of self-manifestation), is the same God with the revealed and circumscribed God; and that, so far from being an unknown God in this regard, he has revealed himself in his relative and circumscribed capacity, for the very purpose of making himself known (so far as the incomprehensible can be made known) in this absolute and uncircumscribed capacity.
So, again, with respect to his secret and his revealed will; or, as I have more correctly distinguished them, his personal and his legislative will; while these are distinct, they are neither opposed to each other, nor unconnected with each other — his legislative will subserves his personal will, and it is his ordained and specially-devised instrument for accomplishing it. By this accomplishment, his great purpose is achieved, in submitting himself to his various creator relationships (to wit, self-manifestation).
In the observations which follow, I do not confine myself to the words immediately under review, but I comprehend the whole of Luther’s expressions and reasonings in this and the three succeeding paragraphs.
Luther does not seem to have apprehended the union and concordance of these two distinct views, in which both God and his will are set forth to us, while he so strongly marks their distinctness; and thus, his answer (not being the whole truth; that is, not being THE TRUTH; which consists in a harmonious combination of many parts) has an air of evasion and sophistry (to which he does not seem to have been insensible himself), and is, in reality, unsatisfying and repulsive. Is it true, that the proverb, ‘What is above us, is nothing to us,’ has its rightful application here? Is it true that we have nothing to do with this God of majesty, as Luther calls him; the absolute God? What is the knowledge of God — that last, highest, best gift of promise — if not the knowledge of this God? the communication of which is, as we have seen, the very end of creation and of revelation. Again, is it true that the revealed God, or relative God, wills only life? or according to Luther’s own way of stating it, that God has revealed himself in his word only as that God who offers himself to all men, and would draw all men to himself? — Why then does he tell us in that self-same word, that indeed for this very cause he had raised Pharaoh up, to show in him His power; and that His name might be declared throughout all the earth? That it was of the Lord to harden the hearts of the Canaanites, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favour, but that he might destroy them, as the Lord commanded Moses? — That Hophni and Phinehas did not hearken to the voice of their father, because the Lord would slay them? — That he smells a sweet savour of Christ in those who perish? — That whom he will he hardens? — That there are those ordained of old to condemnation? Those appointed to stumble at the stone? — Those whom he has commanded to fill up the measure of their iniquities? — That He is, in short, a potter having power over the clay, and using that power? — Has he proclaimed all this concerning himself in his word? Does he, moreover, make that word his great instrument of bringing these things to pass; and is it true nevertheless, that his word stands in contrast, no, in direct opposition to himself, so that we are wisely counselled to attend to his word in contrast, and even in opposition, to God who gave it? Had Luther discerned the simple end of creation and revelation, God manifesting himself as what he really is in his essence (in which essence, hatred of that which is contrary to himself is as much a part as love of that which is like himself); and seen that by means of creation and revelation, God is actually effecting this end he would not have talked of salvation being the revealed God’s alone work; nor have said that we have to do with his word, but not with himself; nor have warned us that we have nothing to do with His inscrutable will (including in this all that Luther includes in it) — when that inscrutable will is made a matter of instruction in his word, and is declared to be what he is continually fulfilling in us;
