In a desperate attempt to try to support Sola Fide in early Christianity, some Protestant apologists will try to argue that the use of “faith alone” in some writers is support for their position. However, this is problematic for many reasons, including it being the “word-concept” fallacy. Furthermore, for an author to be teaching the historic, confessional Protestant understanding of “sola fide,” they must be teaching the following about “faith” and related topics:
·
Created Righteousness
·
Faith an empty/worthless virtue
·
Instrumental extrinsic cause
·
Conduit of Justification
·
Forensic/Taxonomic
Reclassification (Nominalist)
·
Transfer of Created Merit
·
Separation of Activities
·
Zero Sum
·
Quantitative
·
No Merit simpliciter
Furthermore, Pelagius used “faith
alone” approvingly in his commentaries on Romans,
Galatians,
and Ephesians,
but no one worth their salt would ever claim that Pelagius was teaching the
understanding of “faith alone” in the Westminster Confession of Faith or the
Institutes by Francis Turretin.
An example of one early (4th
century) Christian author who used “faith alone” that some Protestants have
appealed to is that of Marius Victorinus’ commentary on Galatians (c. 363). On
Gal 3:6, he wrote:
For
example, Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him as justice (3:6). This is laid down in Genesis: Abraham
believed God and it was accounted to him as justice. This is the way that
God works powers: when faith arises in people’s souls, a faith such that
they believe in God. Because Abraham believed God, Paul says, it was accounted
to him as justice. For this reason, then, you too have suffered, endured, and
conquered so many things; and for this reason God has worked and does work
powers among you: because you believed God through a hearing of faith.
Therefore
it is understood that those who stand on the basis of faith are the children of
Abraham (3:7). To the seed of Abraham
have been promised many things. Now, Abraham himself was found acceptable, as
regards justice (acceptus est ad iustiatam), based on his faith. All
of those who stand on the basis of faith, then, are among the children of
Abraham, as I have often pointed out. The entire Mystery, which was enacted by
our Lord Jesus Christ, requires faith alone (fidem solam). For
then will it have been enacted on our behalf, enacted for our resurrection and
liberation, if we but have faith in Christ and in Mystery of Christ. For by
this treatment of Abraham, the divine reality set out beforehand and gave
advance notice that human beings would be justified based on faith. As it was
accounted to Abraham as justice, then, because he had faith, therefore, if we
have faith in Christ and his whole Mystery, we too will be children of Abraham.
This means that our whole life will be accounted to us as justice. Indeed, Paul
has added along these lines that the Mystery was carried out in the case of
Abraham on the grounds that human beings would be justified based on faith—obviously,
the faith in Christ. (Stephen Andrew Cooper, Marius Victorinus' Commentary
on Galatians [Oxford Early Christian Studies; New York: Oxford University
Press, 2005], 290-91)
On “as regards justice,” Stephen
Andrew Cooper, the translator, noted:
acceptus est ad iustitiam. This would be seen
to be an indication that Victorinus did not connect justification with God’s
foreseeing of future merits, although he may have invoked God’s foreseeing of
faith in his lost commentary on Romans, much as Augustine did in his Expositio
ad Romanos (10-11; CSEL 84, 34, 22 ff.). Augustine changed his mind on this
in De div. quaest., whereas Pelagius made God’s justification depend on
foreknowledge (for discussion, see de Bruyne, Pelagius’ Commentary, 20-24).
Victorinus’ discussions of predestination and good works (found in his comments
on Eph. 1;4, 1:11, and 2:10) never suggest any predestination to specific works
foreseen by God. (ibid., 290 n. 168)
That Victorinus did not use “faith
alone” in the way a Protestant understands the term can be seen how he believed
that sanctification was by “faith alone” (which is not a
Protestant belief). On Gal 2:16, he wrote:
What
precisely is our reason, since we were Jews? Obviously, because we know that
people are not justified based on works of the Law but are justified through
faith, the faith in Jesus Christ. So since we knew this, says Paul,
we have come to believe in Christ Jesus, and we believe in order that we might
be justified based on faith, not works of the Law, seeing that no
flesh—that is, the human being who is in flesh—is justified based on
works of the Law. So knowing this, if we have believed that justification comes
about through faith, we are surely going astray if we now return to Judaism,
from which we passed over to be justified based not on works but faith, and
faith in Christ. For faith itself alone grants justification and
sanctification (fides sola iustificationem dat et sanctificationem). Thus any flesh whatsoever—Jews or those from the Gentiles—is justified
on the basis of faith, not works or observances of the Jewish law (Ipsa enim
fides sola iustificationem dat et sanctificationem. Ita quaelibet caro, sive Iudaei,
sive ex gentibus, non ex operibus neque observatione legis Iudaeorum, sed
iustificatur ex fide). (Ibid., 281-82)
Further evidence against this
misreading of Victorinus can be seen in his comments on Gal 5:6:
For
in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything,
but faith which works through love counts (5:6). Everywhere Paul states that when it comes to
faith, all else ceases to count. This means social status, gender, or anything
done that concerns the body, whether about, on, or for the sake of the body:
circumcision works, and other practices of this sort. None of these, he says,
counts as anything in Christ. Therefore, circumcision is useless, although ti
is not as if we count as anything in Christ on the basis of our uncircumcision.
Because we have taken up faith in him, because we believe his promises, and
because we ourselves rise up on the basis of his resurrection, and we have
suffered all things with him, we also rise with him—though through him—to life,
our faith is sure. Through this faith comes our
working for salvation; and it behooves us to take it on (per quam
fidem operatio fit ad salute et per caritatem accipere nos opertere)
through the love which we have for Christ, for God, and hence toward every
person. For these two have the greatest corrective effect on every life, fulfil
the whole force of the Law, and contain all those things which are precepts in
the Decalogue—if it follows of necessity that those who keep faith would uphold
love. These two fulfil all that the law of Christ reaches. I have dealt very
often with these matters: that faith liberates and love builds up. (Ibid., 330-31)
per
quam fidem operatio fit ad salute et per caritatem accipere nos opertere. The object of the verb accipere (‘to
take [it] on’) is unspecified. Gori (CorPat, 287) judges it to be the ‘salvation’
just mentioned, with the sense that we ‘receive salvation’ (at the judgment)
through our works of love but not because of them. (This would fit Victorinus’
insistence in his comment on the previous verse that the eternal life attained
is not based on works or merit, which at any rate must be understood as the
presuppositions behind the whole discussion). However, the unspecified object
of accipere could also be ‘our working’ (operatio), which I think
renders a better sense along the lines clarified in his discussion of Phil.
2:12-13 (KJV: ‘Therefore, he says, work out your salvation, but this
very working is none the less from God. For God works in you, and works that
you would wilil thus [sc. As in the lemma, pro bona voluntate];
and the will is ours, as it were (et velle quasi nostrum est), whence we
work our salvation for ourselves. None the less, because this very will from
God works in us, it happens that we have both working and will on the basis of
God’s activity (fit ut ex deo et operationem et voluntatem habeamus)’
(Gori, 195, 26-31). In line with this, his point on Gal 5:6 is that the faith
inspired by God produces love for God, Christ, and the neighbour. Thus faith
and love fulfil the law of Christ, as he states in the conclusion of this
comment. (Ibid., 330 n. 155)
It should also be noted that Victorinus taught baptismal regeneration in his commentary on Gal 3:26-27 and his commentary on the Book of Revelation.
