Two Dissertations · §370 · John Davenant

Cap. IV Arg. 4 Sol: John 6:37 — donation causes coming; elegit in Christo mis-exposed

John 6:37 helps here: Whatever the Father gives me will come to me. The donation marks God's eternal election; coming marks faith produced in human hearts in its time. The giving leads to coming — rests on a false reading of He chose us in Christ.

Latin

Huc faciunt illa Christi verba apud Johannem vi. 37. Quicquid mihi dat Pater, ad me veniet. Donatio haec aeternam Dei electionem designat: Venire, fidem in humanis cordibus suo tempore productam denotat: a donatio innuitur causa antecedanea veniendi, id est, credendi: non autem fides praevisa causa antecedanea donandi, hoc est, eligendi. Quod autem afferunt ad Majoris confirmationem, Deum non posse illum eligere in Christo qui non est in Christo: Illi autem tantum in Christo sunt, qui a Deo considerantur ut Christo inserti per fidem: ergo soli credentes eliguntur: haec argumentatio nititur falsa expositione illorum verborum Apostolicorum, Elegit nos in Christo.

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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.

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