Two Dissertations · §146 · John Davenant

Cap. 7 Arg. 4: Isa 53:10–11 long-lived seed—Luther, Calvin, Musculus on elect Church

Isaiah 53:10–11 gives a like promise of God the Father about the efficacy of Christ’s death for the elect. The words run: “If he shall put his soul for sin, he shall see a long-lived seed; and the will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. For the travail of his soul he shall see and be satisfied,” and so on. By these words the Father promises the Son that his passion and death will not be useless or barren, but will surely yield him seed. I ask, then: does this promise look to vague, indefinite individuals, or to certain persons singularly known to the Father and to Christ the Mediator? To invent a confused promise of some who will be saved, yet not yet singularly designated by God himself, is most unworthy of divine perfection and wisdom. But if God and Christ have settled that this seed will be efficaciously saved through Christ’s death, it follows that in the dying Christ there was, with respect to their salvation, an efficacious and singular intention. All interpreters of the place have taken it so: that through Christ’s death a most efficacious and certain liberation and salvation was promised to his mystical body—that is, to the Church, or the elect. So Luther: the posterity or seed spoken of is the Church; “he shall see seed” means he will have a kingdom and royal children. So Calvin: “he shall see seed” means Christ’s death will be the cause of begetting offspring, because the One who died, making alive, will acquire a people of his own. Musculus agrees, explaining “from the travail of his soul he shall see and be satisfied”: Christ already saw this bond of the elect and those to be saved, still sees it, and will see it to the world’s end, and is satisfied in seeing, because the Father’s good pleasure is directed in his hand. All agree that from the Father’s special good pleasure an efficacious salvation of the Church—certain persons known to God alone—was promised to Christ as the price of his passion, and that Christ intended and labored with a singular, efficacious will to save these elect, this peculiar people singularly given and committed to him by the Father.

Latin

Esai. liii. 10, 11. non dissimilis exstat promissio Dei Patris de efficacia mortis Christi quoad electos: Verba sic se habent, Si posuerit pro peccato animam suam, videbit semen longaeuum: & voluntas Domini in manu ejus dirigetur. Pro eo quod laboravit anima ejus, videbit & saturabitur, &c. Deus Pater hisce verbis promittit Filio, passionem & mortem ejus non fore inutilem aut infructuosam, sed semen illi indubie partituram. Quaero igitur an haec promissio vaga & incerta individua respiciat, an personas certas Deo Patri ac Christo Mediatori singulariter notas. Proculdubio confusam promissionem fingere de salvandis aliquibus, sed ab ipso Deo nondum singulariter designatis, est Divina perfectione & sapientia indignissimum. Quod si Deo Christoque constiterit, de hoc semine efficaciter salvando per mortem Christi, consequetur, in Christo moriente fuisse, respectu salutis eorundem, efficacem & singularem intentionem. Omnes hujus loci interpretes ita eum intellexerunt, ut per Christi mortem efficacissimam & certissimam liberationem ac salutem mystico corpori ejus, id est, Ecclesiae, sive electis, promissam fateantur. Sic Lutherus, Posteritas sive semen de quo loquitur, est Ecclesia. VIDEBIT SEMEN, id est, habebit regnum & regios liberos. Sic Calvinus, VIDEBIT SEMEN, significat: Mortem Christi causam fore gignendae sobolis, quia mortuus vivificans populum sibi peculiarem acquiret. Non dissentit Musculus explicans illa verba, De labore animae suae videbit, & satiabitur. Affinitatem hanc electorum & salvandorum vidit jam olim Christus, videt etiamnum, & ad finem mundi usque videbit, videndoque saturatur, quia placitum Dei Patris sui in manu ipsius dirigitur. Omnes hi consentiunt, ex speciali beneplacito Dei Patris efficacem salutem Ecclesiae, id est certarum quarundam personarum Deo soli notarum, Christo tanquam pretium passionis suae fuisse promissam, Christumque pro salvandis hisce electis, sive hoc populo peculiari a Deo Patre singulariter sibi dato & commendato, singulari & efficaci voluntate intendisse & laborasse.

Report a mistake in this passage

About this text

John Davenant argues from Scripture that Christ's death is a remedy offered to every person, so that anyone who hears the Gospel may be called to believe, and then opens a second dissertation on predestination.

John Davenant (1572–1641) was Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, bishop of Salisbury from 1621, and England's leading delegate to the Synod of Dort. A Reformed theologian of the moderate school, he defended universal atonement language within a Calvinist frame.

The Two Dissertations (1650) press two theses: that Christ died sufficiently for all, and that God sincerely calls all who hear the gospel — against the novel claim that Christ died only for the elect in every sense. They are Davenant's mature statement of the hypothetical-universalist position that divided English Calvinists.

This volume covers the opening of the first dissertation through the close of chapter 3, with the theses on the extent of Christ's death.

Date1572–1641 AD (Bishop of Salisbury; 1650 Cambridge imprint)

The 1683 reprint was not used as base text. No modern English was copied.

Printed text used

Also checked PDF of the 1650 (Latin · print facsimile)
Also checked DjVu machine-read text of the 1650 (Latin)

We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Latin on any section, or the Latin source link, to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

Report a mistake