Charles Hodge:

1) This teaches, 1. That the certainty of salvation is secured by the death of Christ. He did not die merely to render salvation possible, but to make it certain. This it does because it is a complete satisfaction of justice. It answers all the ends which our perdition could possibly answer, and therefore it renders that perdition unnecessary. Christ cannot fail to see of the travail of his soul. Those cannot perish for whom he died. That Christ died to render salvation not only possible, but certain, is true, secondly, because the salvation of his people was promised him in that covenant, in the execution of which he laid down his life. Charles Hodge, ‘Christ, His Person and Offices,” in Conference Papers, (New York, Charles, Scribner’s Sons, 1879), 38.

2) As God in the course of nature and in the dispensation of his providence, moves on in undisturbed majesty, little concerned at the apparent complication or even inconsistency of one effect or one dispensation with another; so the Spirit of God in the Bible unfolds the purposes, truths, and dealings of God, just as they are, assured that even finite minds will ultimately be able to see the consistency of all his revelations. The doctrines of foreordination, sovereignty, and effectual providential control, go hand in hand with those of the liberty and responsibility of rational creatures. Those of freedom from the law, of salvation by faith without works, and of the absolute necessity of holy living stand side by side. On the same page we find the assurance of God’s love to sinners, and declarations that He would that all men should come unto Him and live, with explicit assertions that He has determined to leave multitudes to perish in their sins. In like manner, the express declarations that it was the incomprehensible and peculiar love of God for his own people, which induced Him to send his Son for their redemption; that Christ came into the world for that specific object; that He died for his sheep; that He gave Himself for his Church; and that the salvation of all for whom He thus offered Himself is rendered certain by the gift of the Spirit to bring them to faith and repentance, are intermingled with declarations of good-will to all mankind, with offers of salvation to every one who will believe in the Son of God, and denunciations of wrath against those who reject these overtures of mercy. All we have to do is not to ignore or deny either of these modes of representation, but to open our minds wide enough to receive them both, and reconcile them as best we can. Both are true, in all the cases above referred to, whether we can see their consistency or not…

The opposite, or anti-Augustinian doctrine, is founded on a partial view of the facts of the case. It leaves out of view the clearly revealed special love of God to his peculiar people; the union between Christ and his chosen; the representative character which He assumed as their substitute; the certain efficacy of his sacrifice in virtue of the covenant of redemption; and the necessary connection between the gift of Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit. It moreover leads to confused and inconsistent views of the plan of salvation, and to unscriptural and dangerous theories of the nature of the atonement. It therefore is the limited and meager scheme; whereas the orthodox doctrine is catholic and comprehensive; full of consolation and spiritual power, as well as of justice to all mankind. Charles. Hodge, Systematic Theology, 2:561 and 562.

Wiliams:

1) VI Prop. It was in the Covenant of Redemption, wherein it was adjusted and agreed, what should be thus Satisfactory and Meritorious, and fo effectual to save Sinners. See Isa. liii. 10, 1 1, 12. Psa. xl. 6,7,8. Zech. vi. 13. Job. xvii. 4. The Parties in this Covenant, are the Father and Spirit on the one part; and the Son on the other. Whatever Christ suffered in time, and all the Obedience he yielded, were terms proposed to him, and accepted by him. In that Volume were recorded, what his Work and Rewards were to be; and of the latter, the Salvation of his members is a part. What he herein submitted to, he became obliged as an act of faithfulness to perform. Whatever was herein promised him, he had a right to receive, and did accordingly claim. By this compact, he agreed to be a Subject and Servant; and hence the Law of Mediation did commence as binding. By this compact his Obedience and Sufferings became a Satisfaction, that otherwise had been ineffectual.

Satisfaction imports a refuseableness, antecedently to an agreement: And hence we may perceive, that though what Christ paid was a full equivalent, yet it was not in all things the fame in kind, as man was obliged to. True, Justice took care, that all was inserted into this Covenant, as Christ’s Work, which was necessary to the reparation of its Glory: And hence the great Essentials of the Law of Works were inserted, as Articles to be performed by Christ, viz. sinless Obedience as a man, which is the sum of the Precept, and Death the substance of the Threatening; and these to be done and suffered in this Human Nature. Nevertheless some thing in the Threatenings were incompetent to him; as spiritual Death, the hatred of God, &c. And many Precepts were not agreeable to his circumstances, all which were omitted: Nay, many things, which the Law of Works never enjoined on men, were necessary to be done by the Redeemer, and therefore were super-added. From this Covenant arises the immediate obligation of Christ to all his Obedience, as well as the rule and measure of it; and from this his Title to all the Reward, much of which the premiant Sanction of the Law of Works never contained, and could never give a right to. Daniel Williams, “Discourses on Several Important Subjects,” in Works (London: Printed by James Waugh, at the Turk’s Head, in Lombard-Street. 1750), 4:12-13.  [Some spelling modernized; underlining mine.]

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Aretius:

1) Benedict Aretius has similar expressions on1 Tim. ii. “Christ,” says he, “died for all, yet notwithstanding all do not embrace the benefit of his death, because by their own wickedness, and the corruption of their nature, they despise the offered grace.

Source: John Davenant, Dissertation on the Death of Christ, 338.

2) Observe then that, to whom the fruit of Christ’s death belongs, then in what that deliverance consists. That deliverance belongs to all who were subject to bondage in this life. Now we were all [subject], therefore this deliverance belongs to all. The deliverance also is said to be general or pertaining to all because it pertains to the whole human race, although all do not know or acknowledge the benefit, nor accept it with a grateful mind. Thus it comes to pass that this deliverance is efficacious only in the faithful—Ad Heb ii.

Source: “The Atonement of Christ,” in  Biblical Notes and Queries, (Edinburgh: George Adam Young & Co., 1869), 278-279.

Notes:  Richard Muller in his recent 2008 Mid-America lectures, Varieties of Hypothetical Universalist, has identified Aretius as a non-Amyraldian hypothetical universalist.

It must be kept in mind that very few of Aretius’ works have been translated into English and so we must now rely on secondary sources.

Biographical material:

Benedictus Aretius (1505-1574); studied at Strasburg and Marburg; served as professor of logic at Marburg and, beginning in 1564, as Wolfgang Musculus’ successor as professor of theology in Bern. His major dogmatic work was Examin theologicum (1557) and SS. theolgiae problemata, seu loci comunes (1573). Richard Muller,  Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics 1:42 [first edition].

Some titles by Aretius, demonstrating his influence:

Sermones tres de coena Domini.

In d. Mosis Pentateuchum, hoc est, priscam dei legem, Benedicti Aretii theologi Bernesnis commentarii breues ac dilucidi

Commentarii in Evangelivm Matthaei

Commentarii in euangelium Domini Nostri Iesv Christi secundum Marcum

Commentarii in evangelium Domini Nostri Iesu Christi secundùm Lucam

Commentarii in qvatvor Evangelistas : a Benedicto Aretio Bernensi … conscripti.

Commentarii in sacram Actuum Apostolicorum historiam : facili & perspicua methodo conscripti

Commentarii in Epistolam D. Pauli ad Romanos : facili et perspicua methodo conscripti

Commentarii in epistola D. Pauli ad Galatas

Commentarii in secundam epistolam D. Pauli ad Corinthios

Commentarii in Epistolas D. Pauli ad Philippenses, Colossenses et in utramque ad Thessal.

Commentarii in epistolas Pauli ad Timoth., ad Titum et ad Philem. … cum indice rerum memorabilium.

Commentarij in euangelium … secundum Ioannem

Dick:

1) But how, it may be asked again, could the sufferings of Jesus Christ satisfy for the sins of “a great multitude which no man can number, out of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues?” The common answer is, that the transcendent value of his sufferings was the consequence of the dignity of his nature; and it seems to be sufficient. His sufferings were limited in degree, because the nature in which he endured them was finite; but their merit was infinite, because the suffering nature was united to the Son of God. An idea, however, seems to prevail, that his sufferings were the same in degree with those to which his people were liable; that he suffered not only in their room, but that quantum of pain and sorrow which, if he had not interposed, they should have suffered in their own persons through eternity; and so far has this notion been carried by some, that they have maintained that his sufferings would have been greater or less, if there had been one more, or one fewer to be redeemed. According to this system, the value of his sufferings arose, not from the dignity of his person, but from his power. The use of his Divine person in this case, was not to enhance the merit of his sufferings, but to strengthen him to bear them. If this is true, it was not necessary that he should have taken human nature into personal union with himself; it was only necessary that he should have sustained it; and this he could have done although it had subsisted by itself. That the sufferings of the man Christ Jesus were greater than those which a mere mortal could have borne, will be readily granted; but, although it does not become us to set limits to Omnipotence, yet we cannot conceive him, I think, considered simply as a man, to have sustained the whole load of Divine vengeance, which would have overwhelmed countless myriads of men through an everlasting duration. By its union to himself, his human nature did not become infinite in power; it was not even endowed with the properties of an angel, but continued the same essentially with human nature in all other men. Nor is the supposition which we are considering, at all necessary; for as, in virtue of the union, the sufferings of his human nature were the sufferings of the Son of God, they acquired an incalculable intensity of value, and were equivalent to the sufferings of all his people, as his obedience was equivalent to the obedience which they were bound individually to perform. The will of God determined their degree, and the dignity of his person imparted a worth to them above all price. This view of the subject does not occur, I believe, in some of our Theological systems, and in our popular books; but I persuade myself that it is just, and is preferable to the loose declamatory expressions which we often hear with respect to the greatness of his sufferings. John Dick, Lectures on Theology (New York: M.W. Dodd, 1850), 1:505-506

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