Monday, June 12, 2023

Moïse (Moses) Amyraut (1596-1664) and Belief in a Wider Hope of Salvation

In his A Brief Treatise Concerning Predestination and Its Dependent Principles (1634), when discussing God’s decree, Moïse Amyraut wrote the following:

 

And truly enough there are perhaps many nations to which the clear preaching of the gospel has not yet come by the mouth of the Apostles, nor of their descendants, and who do not have any distinct knowledge of the Savior of the world, it is not necessary to think however that there is either any people, nor even a single man excluded by the will of God, from the salvation that He has acquired for the human race, provided that he takes advantage of the testimonies of mercy that God has given to him. Though again HE does not make known distinctly to all who this Redeemer is by whom they have been saved, such as the Providence by which He preserves them, the temporal blessings through which He arouses them and fills them continually, and the long-suffering and incredible patience which He exercises toward them as to be sufficient preaching for them if they are attentive, in order to make them understand that there is mercy in HIs presence toward him, for those who respond in faith and repentance. Accordingly, the Apostle taught that “the riches of His goodness and patience and of this longsuffering lead men to repentance” (Romans 2:4). Would God, therefore, lead men to repentance for nothing, and by intention, if they came to obey the invitation and repented, to exclude them from His grace? God is too good, and, if one must use the term, too serious, to present to men vain hopes. That is why it is foolish to doubt that if in some nation of the world where even the name of Christ is not known, if it happened that He had come across someone who, touched by the testimonies of God’s mercy which He presents to all parts of men in the administration of the things within the universe, and was truly converted to Him as to obtain the salvation of his grace (and we will see below what faculties or power there is in man to convert himself in this way), it would only give Him joy. (Amyraut on Predestination [trans. Matthew Harding; Charenton Reformed Publishing, 2017], 101-3, emphasis in bold added)

 

In a footnote to the text quoted in bold, Matthew Harding, the translator into English of this work, wrote:

 

Amyraut posits in the following paragraphs what appears to be his contention for the salvation of the heathen who have never heard of Christ. However, as will soon become clear, Amyraut is here stressing (in confusing terms to be sure) his belief that God’s incredible mercy and universal desire for all mankind to be saved such that, although there is no biblical warrant or reason to believe it could be possible, that Amyraut would not be surprised if God made salvation possible through another yet undiscovered means for the heathen who had no opportunity to hear or respond to the gospel. In a sense, Amyraut is declaring that God’s mercy toward the lost is unpredictable once the reality that anyone is saved at all is a testament to God’s goodness and mercy and that in a reality of possibility outside of biblical knowledge, God would still be just to redeem man in any way He saw fit—though Scripture is clear that no man can be saved outside of Jesus Christ (John 14:6). However, Amyraut clearly demonstrates below that there is no salvation outside of Christ (Acts 4:12) and here accentuates that the God of salvation is a God of universal mercy and love and truly desires to save all, even if it were possible that men could come to faith from general revelation. The stress here is God’s loving nature and infinite mercy, not man’s natural capacity for salvation within nature or within himself. The next sentence underlines the very nature of God Himself as true to HIs own mercy, love, and desire for mankind’s salvation whether one sees or not the workings of God’s salvific plan on the earth among all nations. (Ibid., 102 n. 3)