Two Dissertations · §171 · John Davenant

Cap. 7 Patrum close: Paschasius, Gregory, Bernard before Scholastics

8. Paschasius (Bibliotheca Patrum, vol. 9, p. 930) on Matthew 1:21, He shall save his people from their sins: Hence Zechariah says, And he made REDEMPTION OF HIS PEOPLE IN THE HOUSE OF DAVID HIS SERVANT. So the people he foreknew as his he surely came to save; all the rest he left, by his hidden judgment, in the mass of damnation. That teaches Christ came and died with a special intention to save the predestined — an intention he did not have for making others' salvation actual, even while he willed to make salvation obtainable for all under the condition of faith. 9. Gregory the Great, Morals 22.18 (p. 132): For the Only-begotten to intercede for man is to present himself as man before the coeternal Father; to ask for human nature is to have taken that nature up into his Divinity's height. So he intercedes for us not by voice but by compassion, because what he would not have damned in the elect he set free by taking it up. Those last words show plainly that in his whole Mediator's work Christ kept a special eye on freeing the elect without fail. 10. Bernard on Psalm He who dwells in the help of the Most High, verse 9: Christ died for friends — that is, for friends to be won, to make friends out of enemies. A little later: So according to time Christ died for the ungodly, but according to predestination for brothers and friends — as much as to say that Christ dying on the cross had a singular regard for his predestined brothers and future friends.

Latin

8. Paschasius, Biblioth. Patr. tom. 9. pag. 930. in illa verba Matth. i. 21. Saluum faciet populum suum a peccatis, sic scribit, Hinc Zacharias inquit, Et fecit REDEMPTIONEM PLEBIS SUAE IN DOMO DAVID PUERI SUI. Ergo quam sua praescivit, illam proculdubio venit salvare; reliquos omnes occulto suo judicio in massa damnationis reliquit. Quibus verbis docet Christum venisse in mundum, ac mortem subiisse, speciali quadam intentione salvandi praedestinatos, quam specialem intentionem de aliorum salute efficienda minime habuit, utcunque omnibus sub conditione Fidei salutem parabilem reddere voluerit. 9. Gregorius Magnus, moral. lib. 22. cap. 18. pag. 132. Unigenito Dei Filio pro homine interpellare, est apud coaeternum Patrem seipsum hominem demonstrare: eique pro humana natura rogasse, est eandem naturam in Divinitatis suae celsitudine suscepisse. Interpellat igitur pro nobis non voce, sed miseratione, quia quod damnari in electis noluit, suscipiendo liberavit. Notanda sunt imprimis illa ultima verba, quibus clare indicatur, Christum in toto suo officio Mediatorio specialem intuitum habuisse ad electos infallibiliter liberandos. 10. Bernardus in Psalmum, Qui habitat in adjutorio Altissimi, vers. 9. Christus, inquit, pro amicis mortuus est, hoc est acquirendis, videlicet ut amicos faceret ex inimicis. Paulo post, Sic ergo Christus secundum tempus pro impiis mortuus est, secundum praedestinationem autem pro fratribus & amicis. Quod perinde est ac si dixisset, Christum morientem in cruce ad praedestinatos suos fratres & futuros amicos singularem respectum habuisse.

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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)

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