Jonathan Edwards and the Metaphysics of Sin

Oliver D. Crisp

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN:
  9781351924887
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) is widely regarded as America's greatest philosopher-theologian. In the last half century there has been a resurgence of interest in Edwards' work from historians, theologians and philosophers, aided by the publication of the Yale edition of Edwards' Works. Edwards' thinking on sin has long been a mystery to scholars trying to fit his thought into the traditional categories of Reformed theology. What this study shows is that Edwards' theory of sin was an original contribution to philosophical theology, which can only be understood when read on its own terms as a philosophical theory about the nature of sin, its origin and transmission. This constitutes a substantial contribution to the literature on Edwards and, more broadly, to philosophical theology in general.

CHAPTER 1

The Divine Decrees

The doctrine of the divine decrees can often appear to be more than a little arcane to contemporary students of theology. What do we mean by a ‘divine decree’? What has God decreed? Does he ordain all things that come to pass, and if he does, in what order does he ordain them?

These are just some of the questions that a doctrine of the divine decrees raises. What Edwards has to say on this matter is far from being merely abstract. His views on what God decrees had an important impact on what he believed about other aspects of the doctrine of sin. As is often the case in theology, what is said in one place about one theological issue affects what is said about another topic in another area of theology. And Edwards was certainly a thinker who sought to bring together his reflections on theological loci into an integrated whole. Hence, what he says about what God decrees to come to pass will affect what he has to say about what actually does come to pass in the creation, with respect to the doctrine of sin.

There has been some debate about whether Edwards endorsed a supra-, or infralapsarian position with respect to the doctrine of predestination. This chapter seeks to ascertain which of these two positions Edwards actually opted for. We shall see that this is particularly important as it bears upon two related problems that we shall encounter in the course of later discussion on sin: how Adam sinned and the origin of sin, the subjects of Chapters 2 and 3 respectively.

We shall proceed through four stages to a conclusion. The first sets out the problem at issue. The second offers a reading of Edwards’ views on the matter. The third section seeks to analyse whether Edwards’ solution is viable, in light of two recent accounts of Edwards’ position on the divine decrees and election. The fourth section sets out Edwards’ argument and shows that, as it stands, Edwards’ argument is fatally flawed. In its place, I suggest that Edwards would have been more consistent if he had defended a purely supralapsarian position.

Distinguishing Supra- and Infralapsarianism

Let us begin by clarifying some key terms. I take it that a divine decree is a product of God’s ordaining that such-and-such a thing will, or will not come to pass. If God decrees that a thing will or will not be, it will or will not be. There is no possibility that God might ordain and decree that a particular thing comes to pass, and that thing not come to pass. Thus, once God ordains a particular thing will happen, it must happen. For God’s will, according to theologians like Edwards, cannot be frustrated by the interference of created beings. Such a view of a divine decree might well be controversial today, but it has been relatively uncontroversial in the Reformed tradition of which Edwards was a representative. For the sake of brevity, I shall simply assume henceforth that this concept of a divine decree is coherent, though it may be controversial.

We come next to supra- and infralapsarianism. For the purposes of the present argument, supralapsarianism is the view that the decree to redeem the elect and damn the reprobate is followed by the decree to permit the fall. By contrast, infralapsarianism is the notion that God decrees creation, the permission of the fall and election and reprobation in that order. Both these notions involve problems about the ordering of the divine decrees. Both are concerned with the priority of certain decrees in the election and reprobation of humanity over others. But whether one decree is antecedent to another involves a logical, not temporal discrimination. This is an important distinction for what follows, so it is worth pausing to note what these two notions involve.

A logical distinction seeks to tease out the different logical connections there are in a particular issue, and allots priority to those aspects of a problem that are antecedent to those which arise as a result of, or are consequent upon them. So, for example, an argument printed in a philosophy textbook has premises that lead to a conclusion. The order of the argument is logical (the premises are antecedent to the conclusion, from which the conclusion arises). Nevertheless the whole argument exists all at once, temporally speaking. If I read it in a textbook, the premises and conclusion are all present before my eyes, because they do not exist as discrete temporal events. By contrast, if I were to utter the premises and conclusion of a particular argument in, say, a debate with a friend in defence of my views, I should be expressing the parts of the argument in a way that had a chronological (that is, temporal), as well as logical order. For my uttering the first premise (whatever it might be), and the second and subsequent premises and conclusion takes time, each being a temporal event that follows in a chronological sequence. The first premise is uttered at a first moment, the second premise at a second moment and the conclusion at a third moment in time.

With respect to the divine decrees, it is the logical sequence and priority of the decrees with respect to election and reprobation that are the subject of what follows. The question of whether one decree follows another chronologically as a temporal event is a secondary issue.

The logical sequence of God’s predestinating decrees is itself a fascinating and important question, particularly as it bears upon the issue of sin. The question before us is this: did God ordain the election of the redeemed and the reprobation of the damned before the fall, or after the fall?¹ If before, then this raises several significant problems for a concept of God. It seems to mean that God ordains evil, raising the question of the authorship of sin, the subject of Chapter 3. It also calls into question the character of the God who ordains this sin, for whom the fall is merely the consequence of his logically prior decree. But if God ordains reprobation post-fall, other, equally grave questions are raised about the divine nature: does God have to somehow ‘react’ to the sins of his free creatures, putting the incarnation and passion of Christ in place as a kind of fall-back measure because of the fall? If so, what does this say about divine omniscience and wisdom?²

The logical structure of the traditional supralapsarian view of the divine decrees proceeds on the basis of the maxim (taken up by Edwards), ‘what is first in design is last in accomplishment’. This means that the first proposition in the divine decrees with respect to his creation/creatures is the end in view, to which all other decrees are the means. This yields the following logical sequence of decrees:³

(1) The decree of divine self-glorification in

(a) the salvation of the elect as a manifestation of divine grace and mercy,

(b) the reprobation of the damned as a manifestation of divine justice and wrath.

The constituents of (1a) and (1b) exist potentially, as ideas in the divine mind, not actually in the real world (although for Edwards, the real world is an ideal world).⁴

(2) The decree to elect (1a) and reprobate (1b).

(3) The decree to permit the elect and reprobate to fall.

(4) The decree to justify the elect and condemn the non-elect.

By contrast, infralapsarians have traditionally suggested the following order that, as they see it, better fit a biblical chronology:

(1’) The decree to create man holy and complete.

(2’) The decree to permit man to fall by the self-determination of his own will.

(3’) The decree to save a certain number of humanity.

(4’) The decree to pass over the remainder of humanity for the purposes of salvation, punishing them for their sin instead.

The difference between these two conceptions of the divine decrees should now be clear. With this in mind, we can turn to a consideration of Edwards’ views on the matter.

Edwards on Election and Reprobation

Edwards does not set out a systematic presentation of his arguments on this issue. What he does say has to be gleaned from several Miscellany entries, specifically numbers 292, 700 and 704, and related work in his dissertation, End of Creation.⁵ It is to these sources that we now turn in order to ascertain Edwards’ position on this matter.

Edwards on Miscellany 292⁶

As Edwards sees it, the dispute about the divine decrees and the fall concerns (a) whether the creation and fall of humanity are appointed for the salvation of some and damnation of others respectively; (b) whether salvation and damnation are the end for which the creation and fall of humanity are the means; and (c) whether creation and fall are appointed as means to that end.

According to Edwards, the ‘what is first in design is last in accomplishment’ principle is true with respect to the end and means to that end in God’s decrees, but not with respect to every prerequisite condition for that end.⁷ This sounds as though Edwards is trying to avoid the fallacy of division. This fallacy can be expressed in the following way: if the constituents A, B, C, D are together the means to the end of E, it does not follow from this that each individual constituent of the group A, B, C, D is by itself the means to E. So A is not by itself the means to E, nor B, to E, nor C to E and so on. What needs to be distinguished is

. . . that man’s creation and fall were intended last with respect to his last end, but not with respect to his subordinate ends; because they are proper means of the last end, but not [of] his third or fourth or fifth end – for at this rate, man was created for this end, that he might repent! But we are to conceive of things in this order; that that is first in execution is last in intention with respect to the ultimate end; that that is second in execution is last in intention with respect to the next end, etc.⁸

There seem to be three ‘ends’ in view here: the last, the subordinate and the ultimate. We can express this as three principles:

(i) The ultimate end of a thing – an end valued for its own sake, such as God’s self-glorification.

(ii) The last end of a thing – what is aimed at throughout a sequence of events, such as the redemption of the elect.

(iii) Subordinate ends of a thing – stages towards that last end. These are the proper means of that last end, but not of the other subordinate ends, such as regeneration.

Edwards does not clearly define (i) in the text of Miscellany 292, but he does do so in End of Creation, to which we shall come in a moment, and from which the working definition (above) is drawn.⁹ Nor, in the text of Miscellany 292, does he clearly distinguish between (i) and (ii). He seems to use them interchangeably. Once again, it is in End of Creation that he differentiates these two ends with more care.

Nevertheless, we can apply these three principles to God’s purposes for his creatures, in the context of Miscellany 292. Regarding humanity, creation is for the ultimate end of God’s glory, for which creation is the means. All subordinate things decreed of man, including conversion, are towards this goal, because all such subordinate ends are the means to that last end. So the fall is a subordinate end to the glorification of God, the last end of all things. To illustrate this point, consider Trevor (an everyman). If his creation is the means to the greater glory of God (the last and ultimate end), then the intermediate end of Trevor’s conversion along the way to this last end is a subordinate end. As a subordinate end it is the proper means of the last end (God’s glory), but not of other intermediate, or subordinate ends, such as being born, or dying, or whatever. Nor, from what we have seen of Edwards’ tacit appeal to the fallacy of division, is a subordinate end a separate means to an ultimate end, but only one of a coordinate set of means to that end (as A, B, C, D are the coordinate set of means to the end of E, but not individually separate means to E). This means that Trevor’s creation, birth, development, conversion and so on, are together the means to the end of God’s greater glory. But it is not the case that each of these constituents is by themselves the means to this end. Trevor’s development is the means to his understanding the Gospel, which is the means to his conversion and so on. It is only taken together that they are the means to the end of God’s glory. So, God does not intend Trevor’s conversion prior to intending his creation, although his conversion is later in execution, and, on a permissive application of the ‘what is first in design i...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 The Divine Decrees
• 2 Adam’s Fall
• 3 The Authorship of Sin
• 4 The Secret and Revealed Will of God
• 5 Temporal Parts and Imputed Sin
• 6 Inherited Guilt
• 7 The Problem with Occasionalism
• Appendix: The Imputation of Christ’s Righteousness
• Bibliography
• Index