Two Dissertations · §484 · John Davenant

Cap. VI Arg. 11: Matt. 24 — for the elect days shortened; God removes every obstacle

So Christ's words in Matt. 24: to lead astray, if possible, even the elect — and for the elect's sake those days will be shortened. The election decree is of that kind: by it God takes on himself to remove every obstacle that would block the elect's salvation, and to procure means that will infallibly produce it.

Latin

Horsum spectant illa Christi Servatoris dicta, Matt. xxiv: Ita ut in errorem inducantur, si fieri posset, etiam electi. Propter electos breviabuntur dies illi. Tale est ergo decretum electionis, ut ratione illius Deus in se suscipiat omnes obices removere, quae salutem electorum impedirent, et iis ea media procurare, quae salutem eorundem infallibiliter producent.

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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)

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

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