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Thursday, March 4, 2010

2.2.1-2.2.3
The Bondage of the Will

Before Calvin wrote The Institutes, Martin Luther wrote his book directed toward Erasmus entitled The Bondage of the Will.  This was the hardest book I ever read.  It took months to read it, primarily for two reasons: (1) The vocabulary in the book was incredible.  Every page had 2-3 words that I had to stop and look up in a dictionary.  (2) The concept of the will being held in complete bondage was foreign to me.  I spent the first 1/3 of the book not believing that Luther could really be arguing against any type of free will.

There is an interesting little graph in Battles' analysis of The Institutes that gives a visual representation of where certain theologians fall in their beliefs about free will.  The far left is labeled "Man's Power" and the far right is "God's Power."  Pelagius is to the far left since he believed only in free will.  Paul is just right of center and Augustine even further to the right.  Luther's name is all the way over on top of the "God's Power" line.  Calvin is the only one to have his name even further to the right than Luther.

Calvin opens this chapter with a statement that sin not only affects all of mankind, but also infects the entirety of a man's soul.  He then sets some guidelines for avoiding error when making his case for the bondage of the will.  He states that man is incapable of any good, but he should still strive doing good.  Also, by crediting any good to man, we deprive God of his due honor.  Calvin also disregards any notion that any credit be given to man concerning wisdom and virtue.  He writes, "For whatever vain men devise and babble concerning these matters is but smoke.  Therefore Augustine with good reason often repeats the famous statement that free will is by its defenders more trampled down than strengthened."

The next two sections quickly skims some arguments that philosophers and theologians use in defense of the freedom of the will.  Calvin sums up their cases by stating, "This is the sum of the opinion of all philosophers: reason which abides in human understanding is a sufficient guide for right conduct; the will, being subject to it, is indeed incited by the senses to evil things; but since the will has free choice, it cannot be hindered from following reason as its leader in all things."

I will be honest with you: I have difficulty with Luther's and Calvin's understanding of the will - not in terms of salvation because I believe that is God's choice and not ours (praise be to God), but in terms of post-conversion living.  It is my hope to come to a better understanding of their point of view as I continue through this section of The Institutes.

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