Two Dissertations · §381 · John Davenant

Cap. IV Arg. 6: perpetual use of Electi — in salvation contexts always means believers

Arg. 6. Another argument from the standing use of Elect wherever salvation is in view — Rom. 8: Who will accuse God's elect?; Rom. 11: The elect have obtained; Matt. 22: Many called, few elect. From these and like places: the word Elect, when Scripture speaks of salvation, is always used for believers; therefore there is no election to salvation except of believers.

Latin

Arg. 6. Petitur aliud argumentum a perpetuo usu vocis, Electi, quotiescunque ponitur cum respectu ad salutem; ut Rom. viii. Quis accusabit adversus electos Dei? et Rom. xi. Electi assecuti sunt, et Matth. xxii. Multi vocati, pauci electi. Ex hisce aliisque locis consimilibus ita argumentantur; Vox Electorum, cum de salute agitur, perpetuo in Scripturis usurpatur pro credentibus: Ergo nulla est electio ad salutem nisi credentium.

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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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