Antinomianism.
Zion's Advocate, Vol. 43, No. 2, Feb. 1904.
For many centuries those who have believed and advocated the doctrine of salvation by grace alone have been stigmatized by the Arminians as "Antinomians." This charge is so common that many are led to conclude that Antinomianism is the opposite of Arminianism - that to deny that salvation is conditional is to embrace Antinomianism. This mistaken notion arises from a misunderstanding of what Antinomianism really is.This word is from the Greek anti, against, and nomos, law. In its real and most extreme sense it is a declaration that the moral law is no longer binding upon Christians, and that saints have the liberty to perform any act without affecting their moral sanctity. It asserts that nothing to them is sinful. This is regarded as the perfection of Christian liberty.
From the writings of the Apostles, especially of Paul and Peter, it is evident that a tendency to Antinomianism existed even in their day, and history furnishes proof of its existence in different ages, but the term was first used in a religious controversy which sprang up between Martin Luther and John Agricola early in the so-called Reformation inaugurated by Luther. Agricola was born in 1492. He became a learned and talented man, and was one of the most zealous founders of Protestantism, but opposed Melancthon in 1527 for recommending the use of the law, and especially the commandments, in the Christian system. Luther was drawn into the controversy and took a very active part in it. He called the doctrine advocated by Agricola, "Antinomianism."
It is certain that views more extreme than those of Agricola were afterwards advocated by others, and that Antinomianism has been reproduced from time to time with various modifications, without being professed by any distinct sect. It seems that during the period of the Commonwealth in England (1653-1659) Antinomianism in its extreme form attained its greatest popularity. It is a mistaken notion that this doctrine is to be found only among those who hold Calvinistic views. Mr. Scott, a learned commentator, whose "Family Bible with Notes" is among the most valuable of religious works, says in the preface of his sermon on Election and Final Perseverance: "Perhaps speculating Antinomianism abounds most among professed Calvinists, but Antinomians, whose sentiments influence their practice are innumerable among Arminians. Does the reader doubt this? Let him ask any of those multitudes who trample on God's commandments, what they think of predestination and election, and he will speedily be convinced that it is undeniably true, for all these, in various ways, take occasion from the mercy of God to encourage themselves in impenitent wickedness."
We remember once hearing a man say, who was a professed Baptist, that he was a free man; that he was free to go into a saloon when he pleased, to drink whiskey when he pleased, to play billiards when he pleased, or do anything he pleased. He proved that this was his faith by his conduct. Evidently he was an Antinomian. He professed to believe in unconditional salvation, contended that the predestination of God controlled all his actions, and thus perverted the doctrine of grace to the gratification of his own sinful propensities. Such is not the freedom of the gospel. Peter admonishes the saints to put to silence the ignorance of wicked men with well doing, "as free, and not using their liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of God." I. Peter 2:15, 16. They should not yield their members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield themselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead. Romans 6:13.
Having thus defined Antinomianism, we now desire to consider briefly the freedom of the children of God. Those who are born again have been made free from the law in a threefold sense. 1. They have been delivered from condemnation. 2. They have been delivered from death. 3. They have been delivered from the necessity of looking to it and depending upon it as a wife is delivered from her husband by death.
Their deliverance from condemnation has been effected by the washing, sanctifying and justifying work of the Holy Spirit. Paul informed the Corinthians that they had been washed, sanctified and justified "in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." I. Cor. 6:11. Freedom from condemnation and freedom from death are both shown in this passage: "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ hath made me free from the law of sin and death." Romans 8:2. The law of the Spirit spoken of here is not a rule of action prescribed by the Spirit. It signifies the force that acts in producing a certain effect, or rather the nature and method of that force. In philosophy the term law is used with a similar signification; as the law of gravitation, the law of inertia, &c. The law of the Spirit of life is an impartation of divine life by the Spirit, which is always accomplished by an immediate operation of the Spirit upon the dead. "You hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and in sins." The law of sin (condemnation) held the sinner as a captive and death held him as a prey until the Spirit touched him into life and delivered him from his pollution.
The relation of the dead sinner to the law is illustrated by Paul in the 7th chapter of Romans by that of a woman to her husband. The married woman is bound to her husband as long as he lives, so that she would become an adulteress if she should marry another man. "But if her husband be dead she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress though she be married to another man." "Wherefore, my brethren," says the apostle, "ye are also become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, even to him that is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruits unto God." The child of God, in his former state, trusted in the moral law, and it would have been adultery for him to become married to another without first becoming dead to the law. So now it is improper for him to look to the law any longer, for he is married to Christ. He should now serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. Christ has fulfilled the law for his people, having done all it required them to do and having suffered death as the penalty of their violation of it. Those who are in him have that law written in their hearts, so they delight in it after the inner man.
J. R. D.
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