On the Imputation of Adam's First Sin · §465 · Josué de la Place (Placeus)

Chapter 8: Blessed is he whose sin is not imputed, and Adam's sin

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You say the names by which the Psalmist called sins can signify that first rebellion of Adam, namely no less than Cain's murder, or the Israelite people's rebellion. You add that it is anomia, which word the Apostle used in citing this place: Be it so; what follows from that I do not yet understand: for the same may be said of Cain's murder, of the crime of Sodom, of Absalom's incest and rebellion, and finally of any other crime of anyone. But you yourself conclude something; let us hear you then. From there, you say, we ought to conclude according to the Apostle using the Prophet's words, that he is blessed to whom sins are not imputed, and consequently that he is miserable to whom sins are imputed, and since our whole misery is from Adam's first sin, if that sin is imputed to us, we are miserable, if on the contrary it is not imputed to us, we are blessed. You left us, I think, the minor to be subsumed: But we are not blessed: Therefore that sin is imputed to us.

Latin

Ais nomina, quibus Psaltes peccata nuncupavit, posse primam illam Adami rebellionem significare, nempe, haud minus, quam, vel Caini homicidium, vel populi Israelitici rebellionem. Adjicis eam esse ἀνομίαν, qua voce usus est Apostolus in citando hoc loco: Esto; quid inde sequatur nondum intelligo: idem enim de Caini homicidio, de Sodomorum crimine, de Absalomi incestum & rebellione, & denique de quovis alio cujusvis scelere dicere licet. Sed tu ipse aliquid concludis, te igitur audiamus. Inde, inquis, concludere debemus secundum Apostolum verbis Prophetae utentem, illum esse beatum cui peccata non imputantur, & ex consequenti, illum esse miserum cui peccata imputantur, & cum miseria nostra tota sit a peccato primo Adami, si peccatum illud nobis imputatur, nos esse miseros, si e contra nobis non imputetur, nos esse beatos. Tu nobis, opinor, subsumendum reliquisti, Atqui non sumus beati: Ergo nobis peccatum illud imputatur.

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Josué de la Place (Placeus) on the imputation of Adam's first sin: chapters 1 to 12 and 14, and the later disputation up to its chapter on Romans 5:14, from the Latin. The rest is not yet translated.

Josué de la Place (c. 1596–1655), known in Latin as Placeus, was pastor at Nantes and from 1633 professor of theology at the Academy of Saumur, the school of Cameron and Amyraut.

On the Imputation of Adam's First Sin argues the distinctive Saumur thesis: Adam's sin reaches his posterity only mediately, through the inherited corruption — never by immediate reckoning of a sin they did not commit. Fellow Reformed theologians rejected the view, but the book remains its classic statement.

Part only: Chapters 1–12 and 14, and the disputation up to Romans 5:14

Datec. 1645–1655 AD (written after the 1645 Synod of Charenton, and read in draft by Drelincourt by 10 December 1653; printed posthumously at Saumur, 1661; Reformed / Amyraldian circle)

The English is made from the 1661 Saumur Latin of chapters 1 to 12 and 14 and part of the later disputation. No earlier English was copied.

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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.

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