XXIV. ON THE CALVINISTIC VIEWS OF THE EXTENT OF THE ATONEMENT.
THE present discussion is to be occupied with the sentiments of Calvinists on the subject of the extent of the atonement the second of the five points of the Arminian Controversy, viz., particular redemption.
It ought here to be borne in mind that when, in this controversy, the phrases particular and universal redemption are used, they are not at all to be understood in the same sense as particular or universal salvation. The doctrine of the Universalists is quite a different thing from the doctrine of those who maintain universal redemption. The former falls properly to be considered when we come to discuss the final states of men. Arminians, though maintaining general or universal redemption, are not Universalists, but agree with Calvinists as to the matter of fact, that all are not ultimately saved. They differ from the Calvinists respecting the cause of that limitation, denying it to arise at all from any sovereign or special purpose of God. Perhaps the word redemption is not the most happily chosen in the statement of this doctrine, inasmuch as, generally speaking, it is understood of the effects or results to men from the work of Christ, or the ransom paid by Him in His death, rather than of that ransom itself. Yet, being used in both senses, it might be vindicated. It expresses the result to us.1 But we have an instance, I rather think the only one, of its meaning the ransom by which the redemption is effected.2 And in this acceptation it is that the word is now used, when the dispute is, whether the redemption was particular or general. It is the same as the question: Whether the atonement was restricted or universal, for some or for all.
We shall consider the Calvinistic views under three modifications:–1. Hyper-calvinism; 2. Calvinism as more generally held by the orthodox; and, 3. Moderate, or what may be designated modern Calvinism, as held and ably elucidated by the late Andrew Fuller, Dr. Edward Williams, and others, and now embraced by a growing proportion of Calvinistic ministers and professing Christians.
1. Of the hyper-calvinistic views on the present subject I have already indicated my opinion. They are the views of the exact equivalentists, of those who hold a limited atonement in the sense of its being sufficient only, in the way of legal compensation, for the salvation of the elect; so that, if more in number had been to be saved, more suffering must have been endured; that Christ, standing in the room of the elect, and appearing as their substitute and representative, bore their sins exclusively, making an atonement adequate for their remission and for no more; paying precisely (to use the ordinary but much abused phraseology) their amount of debt. This view of the atonement has been held by not a few, and has been advanced anew, and maintained as the only just and scriptural view, by some modern writers.