UPDATED QUOTE!
An updated excerpt from the book “The Dark Side of Calvinism: The Calvinist Caste System” (PDF) – part of a Calvary Chapel “series” (3 books) on Calvinism [back cover at bottom of quote – click to enlarge]:
THE AUGUSTINIANISM OF CALVINISM
Although the five points of Calvinism are most closely associated with the sixteenth century Protestant Reformer John Calvin (and for good reason), they did not originate with him. Calvinists would, first and foremost, contend that the five points faithfully represent the teaching of the New Testament in general, and of the apostle Paul in particular. Obviously, I do not agree with this contention. I do, however, agree with Calvinists when they point out that Calvin was not the first notable figure in church history to champion the views that led to what is today the Calvinist or Reformed system of theology. Just as the Synod of Dort, which first formally presented these points as the five points of Calvinism, was a Calvinist synod, so John Calvin was an Augustinian.
This is especially true with regard to the later Augustinian view of predestination and its bearing upon the salvation of the elect and the damnation of the reprobate. Norman Geisler makes the point that Augustine held two contradictory views, reflecting a change of thought over time. According to Geisler, it is the views of Augustine in the latter part of his Christian life that had such an influence on Calvin and many other Calvinists down through the centuries. This is especially so with regard to the Reformed view of salvation and damnation.59 Lawrence Vance makes the case that Augustine was at once both the father of Roman Catholicism and of Reformed Theology.60
Because of Augustine’s association with the Roman Catholic Church, there are some uninformed Calvinists who believe that Calvin was not influenced by Augustine and that to make this connection is nothing more than a smear tactic on the part of anti-Calvinists. Calvin’s repeated references to Augustine, however, reveal that he gave a lot of weight to what Augustine taught and was in fact echoing Augustine on the most central tenets of Reformed doctrine. Because some Calvinists object to the assertion that Calvin relied upon Augustine to develop and defend his doctrinal distinctives, I will quote from a wide variety of leading Calvinists to establish this statement. Herman Hanko, as non-Roman Catholic as one can be, says:
In fact, our fathers at Dordrecht knew well that these truths set forth in the Canons could not only be traced back to the Calvin Reformation; they could be traced back to the theology of Saint Augustine who lived almost a millennium before Calvin did his work in Geneva. For it was Augustine who had originally defined these truths. Calvin himself, again and again, pays tribute to the work of Augustine and points out that what he is saying has been said before him by the Bishop of Hippo. The Synod of Dordrecht was conscious of this.61
In agreement, Loraine Boettner says:
It was Calvin who wrought out this system of theological thought with such logical clearness and emphasis that it has ever since borne his name. He did not, of course, originate the system but only set forth what appeared to him to shine forth so clearly from the pages of Holy Scripture. Augustine had taught the essentials of the system a thousand years before Calvin was born, and the whole body of the leaders of the Reformation movement taught the same. But it was given to Calvin with his deep knowledge of Scripture, his keen intellect and systematizing genius, to set forth and defend these truths more clearly and ably than had ever been done before.62
Calvinist theologian, R. Laird Harris, also agrees when he points out that:
Although Calvin gave the Reformed doctrine its most thorough formulation, the theology had long been held. Calvin would have been the first to deny its novelty. … Indeed Calvinism is often called Augustinianism.63
Boettner went so far as to say:
The Reformation was essentially a revival of Augustinianism … ,64
- I. Packer echoes this sentiment saying:
The Reformation was an Augustinian Revival.65
Edwin Palmer explains:
The name Calvinism has often been used, not because Calvin was the first or sole teacher, but because after the long silence of the Middle Ages, he was the most eloquent and systematic expositor of these truths.66
For these reasons and some others, Calvin gets the lion’s share of credit for what he did with the teachings of Augustine. According to Boettner:
Inasmuch as it was Calvin who first formulated these principles into a more or less complete system, that system, or creed, if you will, and likewise those principles which are embodied in it, came to bear his name.67
Boettner explains the Reformed view of Calvin’s role in Calvinism as follows:
Calvin’s active and powerful intellect led him to sound the depths of every subject which he touched. In his investigations about God and the plan of redemption he went very far, penetrating into mysteries concerning which the average man seldom if ever dreams. He brought to light a side of Scripture which has as yet been very much in the shade and stressed those deep truths which in the ages preceding the Reformation had comparatively escaped notice in the Church. He brought to light forgotten doctrines of the apostle Paul and fastened them in their full and complete sense upon one great branch of the Christian Church.68
Spurgeon probably speaks for all authentic Calvinists when he says:
That doctrine which is called “Calvinism” did not spring from Calvin; we believe that it sprang from the great founder of all truth. Perhaps Calvin himself derived it mainly from the writings of Augustine. Augustine obtained his views, without doubt, through the Spirit of God, from the diligent study of the writings of Paul, and Paul received them of the Holy Ghost, from Jesus Christ the great founder of the Christian dispensation. We use the term then, not because we impute any extraordinary importance to Calvin having taught these doctrines. We would be just as willing to call them by any other name, if we could find one which would be better understood, and which on the whole would be as consistent with fact.69
William S. Reid, in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, says:
John Calvin, often regarded as “the systematizer of the Reformation,” was a second generation Protestant Reformer of the sixteenth century who brought together biblical doctrine systematically, in a way that no other Reformer before him had done … all Reformed and Presbyterian churches look back to him as the founder of their biblical-theological doctrinal position. … Although Calvin was the systematizer of the Reformation theology, since his day those who have accepted his structure of theology have continued to develop many of his ideas. During his own lifetime he himself developed his thought in the successive editions of his Institutes of the Christian Religion. With the writing of various Calvinistic confessions as the Heidelberg Catechism (1563), and the Canons of Dort (1618), and the Westminster Confession and Catechisms (1647-48) additions to and further developments in theological thought have appeared.70
While Reformed Theology—the theology of Calvin and Calvinism itself—is often thought of as the theology of the Reformation, this is imprecise at best. In fact, church historian Bruce Shelly says:
Calvin’s leadership … shaped a third reformation tradition. Today we call it Reformed or Calvinistic Christianity. It includes all Presbyterians, Dutch and German Reformed Churches, and many Baptists and Congregationalists.71
In fairness, I should point out that when Reformed denominations become liberal they lose their Calvinism along with their part in biblical Christianity. Thus, one could qualify the Calvinists among these groups as Evangelical or even Conservative Presbyterians, Congregationalists, etc. I should also point out that while there have always been Calvinist Baptists, variously called Reformed, Particular, or even Sovereign Baptists, etc., Baptists as a whole tend not to buy in to Reformed Theology. Still, in all of the mainstream Baptist denominations, there are those who are mounting a major effort to turn all Baptists (or as many as possible) into Reformed or Calvinist Baptists. Some even believe that a non-Reformed Baptist is not a true Baptist. One only needs to read The Other Side of Calvinism to see how wrong it is to equate Reformed Theology with the theology of mainstream Baptists.
NOTES
59 Norman Geisler, Predestination and Free Will (Downers Grove, 111.: InterVarsity Press, 1986), 68.
60 Vance, The Other Side of Calvinism, 37-68.
61 Hanko, Hoeksema, and VanBaren, The Five Points of Calvinism, 10.
62 Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 3-4.
63 Charles F. Pfeiffer, Howard F. Vos, and John Rea, eds. The Wyclijfe Bible Encyclopedia A-J. R. Laird Harris, “Calvinism.” (Chicago, 111.: Moody Press, 1975), 293.
64 Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 367.
65 J. I. Packer, “The Love of God: Universal and Particular.” Schreiner and Ware, eds. The Grace of God, the Bondage of the Will, 420.
66 Palmer, The Five Points of Calvinism, Foreword.
67 Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination, 4.
68 Ibid, 5.
69 Spurgeon, The Spurgeon Sermon Collection, Vol. 2, 216.
70 William S. Reid, “Calvinism,” Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Ed. Walter A. Elwell (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1984), 186-188.
71 Bruce L. Shelley, Church History in Plain Language (Dallas, Tex.: Word Publishing, 1995), 257.
(Video Description – below) The provided text, excerpts from “AntiCALVIN The Gnostic Origins of Calvinism” by Ken Johnson, Th.D., establishes a detailed argument tracing the theological origins of Calvinism, particularly the doctrines codified in TULIP (Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace, and Perseverance of the Saints), back to ancient Gnostic and Manichaean heresies rather than scriptural orthodoxy. The author contends that concepts such as predestination and the denial of free will were first espoused by groups like the Valentinian Gnostics and were later incorporated by thinkers like Augustine of Hippo during debates against Pelagianism. A significant portion of the material contrasts the Calvinist definitions of these core theological points with the Arminian and “biblical” positions, often appealing to the writings and testimonies of the Ancient Church Fathers to support the idea that early Christianity affirmed free will and resisted doctrines leading to double predestination. Ultimately, the work aims to dismantle Calvinist theology by exposing its claimed “Gnostic origins” and demonstrating its contradiction with the beliefs of the immediate successors to the apostles.
A simplistic understanding of church history claims:
- “Augustine introduced a dozen novel Doctrines in the course of his writing one short letter; then, he developed amnesia on his new doctrines for the next fifteen years.”
However, we know from his going back in time and changing [rewriting portions of] his views (for instance in Ad Simplicianum [2.5-22] and Lib. arb.3.47-54) that his reverting back to his neo platonic/Gnostic roots is clearly earmarked at the AD 412 mark.
His changes included not acceptance of,
- Total Inability
- Double Predestination
- No choice in choosing spiritual goodness
- God is just despite creating people intended for an eternal torture in hell with no ability to choose the good even when offered it.
Calvin (and to a lesser degree, Luther) plumed these later changes and incorporated them specifically into their reformational undercutting of the early Baptists and the SOLAs.
ADDITION: to be clear, we possess no writings from any prior Christian author who held such pagan views – which were plentiful in Platonism, Stoicism, and Gnosticism before AD 412.
I wish every person interested could at least read chapter 6 of “Calvinism: A Biblical and Theological Critique” WOWZA.
Here are a few pages (& PDF)
Why Did Augustine Revert to Pagan Salvific Determinism in AD 412?
The major influence on Augustine’s AD 412 reversion to his prior deterministic Manichaean interpretations of Scripture was the arrival of Pelagius and Caelestius near his North African home in late AD 411. Augustine previously admitted (AD 405) he did not know why infant baptism was practiced (Quant.80). But the conflict with Caelestius and Pelagius forced him to rethink the church’s infant baptismal tradition and precipitated his reversion to his pagan DUPED.26 Caelestius had argued that infants did not receive baptism for salvation from sin but only for inheritance of the kingdom. Augustine’s polemical response to Caelestius in AD 412 was logical: (1) Infants are baptized by church tradition; (2) water baptism is for forgiveness of sin and reception of the Holy Spirit; (3) some dying infants are rushed by their Christian parents to the bishop for baptism but die before baptism occurs, while other infants born of prostitutes are found abandoned on the streets by a church virgin who rushes them to the baptismal font where the bishop baptizes them; (4) these infants have no “will” and no control over whether or not they are baptized to receive the Holy Spirit to become Christians. Therefore, God must unilaterally and unconditionally predetermine which infants are saved by baptism and which are eternally damned without baptism (unconditional election).27 God’s election must be unconditional since infants have no personal sin, no merit, no good works, no functioning free will (incognizant due to the inability to understand at their age), and therefore, no choice.
In his next work that same year, Augustine concluded if this is true for infants, then unbaptized adults also have no choice or free will (Sp. et litt.54– 56). The Holy Spirit was received in water baptism, transforming the person into a Christian with a free will. Since humans have no free will before baptism, God must unilaterally choose who will be saved and infuse faith into those persons. Augustine taught even when “ministers prepared for giving baptism to the infants, it still is not given, because God does not choose [those infants for salvation]” (persev.31). Infant baptism became the impetus for Augustine’s novel theology when he reinterpreted that church tradition and reached a logical conclusion. By doing this he abandoned over three hundred years of church teaching on free will. According to the famous scholar Jaroslav Pelikan, Augustine departed from traditional Christian theology by incorporating his prior pagan teachings and thereby developed inconsistencies in his new anthropology and theology of grace, especially his “idiosyncratic theory of predestination.”28
Augustine Reverted to His Prior Pagan Philosophies in AD 412
The controversy over infant baptismal regeneration propelled Augustine to revert to his pagan training. Augustine’s reading of the Neoplatonism of Plotinus (Enneads) and Porphyry provided vital concepts he would incorporate from philosophy into his new theology.29 Evil produced an incapacitating fall with a total loss of the image of God in humans (Enn.1.1.12; 1.8.5; 4.3.12). In Neoplatonism, all humans were created as pure spirits (no physical body). Their voluntary choice to become physical resulted in the loss of free will.
By this choice humanity lost the “good will” and became inextricably chained in universal wickedness from an “evil will” (Enn.3.2.10; cf. Stoicism). This required the Spirit to implant the desired love and restore the “good will” by divine infusion (Enn.3.5.4; 1.7.9; 3.2.9.1; 2.3.1.1; 3.3.19–21; 4.8.5.1– 4). Although human souls do not possess genuine free will, (somehow) neither do they act by compulsion (Enn.4.3.13).30 The Neoplatonic “Reason-Principle” (god) purposefully created only a few individuals to whom he would gift a “good will” but created many more evil individuals who would remain devoid of personal choice. These evil persons were created as predestined to damnation. Nevertheless, those created for damnation remain inexcusably culpable and guilty, because the universe is just and good when each person accepts his or her god-imposed role, including those eternally tortured screaming in pain (Enn.3.2.17). Because “The One” (god) can only do good, he is exonerated by doctrinal definition from committing any injustice. These pagan philosophical teachings were the warp and woof of Augustine’s earlier studies, and these buttressed his theological answers to the Pelagian challenge.
Augustine utilized all these Neoplatonic doctrines after AD 411: (1) humanity’s fall resulted in total inability to respond with loss of free will (leaving only an evil will); (2) individuals were created for the purpose of damnation unto God’s glory; (3) individuals were culpable despite the lack of any choice to do good or respond positively; and (4) God was just, despite deliberately creating persons for eternal torture. After AD 412 Augustine regurgitated these pagan doctrines. “This absolutely obvious truth by which we see that so many are not saved because God does not will this, though human beings do” (Ep.217.19). God purposefully created persons to damn them eternally (Nupt. et conc.2.31–32). We possess no writings from any prior Christian author who held such pagan views.
Similarly, in AD 412, Manichaean Divine Unilateral Predetermination of Eternal Destinies (DUPED) invaded Christianity through Augustine. Foreknowledge now resulted from God unilaterally predetermining the elect (in other words, divine foreordination preceded divine foreknowledge). This was a Gnostic requirement. “Present a command to us to see Thee, so that we may be saved. Knowledge of Thee, it is the salvation of us all! Present a command! When Thou dost command, we have been saved” (The Three Steles of Seth, 125). Augustine wrote a similar line: “Give what you command, and command what you will” (Conf.10.40).
Thus, Augustine abandoned the unanimous consensus of the earlier Christian view and reverted to his Gnostic-Manichaean deterministic interpretations of Christian Scripture in AD 412. This can be best visualized by examining the following chart that compares the different interpretations of key Scripture passages by early Christians, Gnostic-Manichaeans, and Augustinian-Calvinists.
*Greek eudokias; the five other texts (Ps 5:13, 68:14, 144:16; Sir 15:15; Luke 2:14) containing eudokia refer to favor, acceptance, or good pleasure; “good willer” is my pejorative term for the pagan concept of a formal faculty that can “will good” (Stoic/ Neoplatonic/ Manichaean). It must be gifted by god/ the One to overcome the “evil will” in spiritually dead persons incapable of a positive response to god/ the One’s offer of salvation. The same passages the Gnostics and Manichaeans had interpreted as deterministic are now used by modern Calvinists to prove total depravity and unconditional election (the essential elements of Divine Unilateral Predetermination of Eternal Destinies, DUPED).
Gnostics and Manichaeans had used these same Christian Scriptures (listed above) for centuries to promote their unilateral determinism. Before Augustine, orthodox Christians had refuted heretical Gnostic and Manichaean DUPED and “interpreted proorizō [election] as depending upon proginoskō (foreknow)—those whom God foreknew would believe he decided upon beforehand to save. Their chief concern was to combat the concept of fatalism and affirm that humans are free to do what is righteous.”31
Augustine’s move toward DUPED was recognized by his peers, so he was accused of reverting to his prior Manichaean theology.32 But as a splendid rhetorician, Augustine defended himself brilliantly by creating a subtle distinction. He modified Gnostic/Manichaean “created human corrupt nature” (producing damnation) into a Christianized “fallen human corrupt nature” in Adam with inherited guilt (producing damnation; Nupt. et conc.2.16). Augustine’s novel nuanced “fallen” nature borrowed a key Gnostic/Manichaean and Neoplatonic doctrine: humans have total inability to respond to God until divinely awakened from spiritual death.
Furthermore, to avoid violating centuries of unanimous Christian teaching, Augustine had to redefine the Christian meaning of free will. He concluded God must micromanage and manipulate the circumstances that guarantee a person would “freely” respond to the invitation of God’s calling to eternal life.33 This should be compared to placing a mouse in a maze, then opening and closing doors so the mouse could “freely” reach the cheese. (In Christian theology that emphasized free will, all doors remained open for the maze traveler to choose his or her own path.) Augustine’s redefined free will was Stoic “non-free free will.” A millennium later, Calvinists would label this divine manipulation of the human free will by the term irresistible grace (God forcing a person to “love” him).
NOTES
26 Wilson, 285. See also Chadwick, Early Christian Thought, 110–11.
27 Augustine, Pecc.mer.1.29–30. In contrast, ca. AD 200, Tertullian had rejected infant baptism, stating one should wait until personal faith was possible (De bapt.18).
28 Jaroslav Pelikan, The Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine, vol. 1, The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition (100–600) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975), 278–327, quotation at 325.
29 O’Daly, Platonism Pagan and Christian, 719.
30 This equivocation was also practiced by the ardently deterministic Stoics, since a total absence of free will was untenable to many among the ancient populace.
31 Carl Thomas McIntire, “Free Will and Predestination: Christian Concepts,” in The Encyclopedia of Religion, 15 vols., ed. Lindsay Jones, 2nd ed. (Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005), 5:3206–9.
32 C. Jul. imp.1.52. His ordination as a bishop was blocked and almost prevented due to his prior Manichaeism. See Jason D. BeDuhn, “Augustine Accused: Megalius, Manichaeism, and the Inception of the Confessions,” Journal of Early Christian Studies 17, no. 1 (2009): 85–124; and Henry Chadwick, “Self-Justification in Augustine’s Confessions,” English Historical Review 178 (2003): 1168. As in the chart above, see Augustine’s Manichaean interpretations of Romans 9–11 (Pecc. merit.29–31, Spir. et litt.50, 60, 66; Nupt.2.31–32, C. du ep. Pelag.2.15, Enchir.98, C. Jul. 3.37,4.15, Corrept. 28); Eph 2:8–10 (Spir. et litt.56, C. du ep. Pelag., Enchir.31, Praed.12); John 14:6 and 6:44, 65 (C. du ep. Pelag.1.7, Grat.3–4,10); and Phil 2:13 (Spir. et litt.42, Grat. Chr.1.6, C. Jul.3.37, 4.15, Grat.32, 38).
33 Burns, “From Persuasion to Predestination,” 307.
David L. Allen (Editor), Steve W Lemke (Editor), Calvinism: A Biblical and Theological Critique (Nashville, TN: B & H Academic, 2022), 222-226.