From Reformation to Reformation

But this Immutability of God pertains, α. to God’s Existence, Eternally, in accordance with § 31, 32. β. To His Essence, forever the same, according Psalm 102:27, and so not subject to the possibility of Annihilation, which the Necessity of His Existence implies, concerning which in § 21. Neither does the Essence of God suffer any Mutation, either, 1. By Creation, which, as far as God is concerned, is not some accidental property of God, but His active Essence was already fro

From Simplicity flows Immutability, which, as it was organized by our AUTHOR, is proven, 1. From Sacred Scripture, among other passages, James 1:17, where to God is denied, not only παραλλαγὴ/ variableness, but even any τροπῆς ἀποσκίασμα, shadow of turning/ change. The very Sun in the eclipse of its Light suffers, if not change, at least shadowing: but not so the Father of Lights, in whom there is not even the slightest appearance of change. For an illustration of this text f

β. On the other hand, God’s Simplicity excludes all Composition that God might enter into with the Creature. For, if, 1. God’s Simplicity prevents all Composition, then it also prevents Composition with Creatures. By which, 2. the Immutable God would have endured actual Mutation. By which also, 3. God, who is distinguished from all other things by His Independence, would be made Dependent: since in the coming together of multiple things to constitute a composite, properly so

The Simplicty of God excludes: α. On the one hand, all Partial Communication of the Divine Essence, whether with all Creatures, or with man; just as the Manicheans are related to have held that all Creatures were propaged from God’s Essence as a vine, and that the Soul of Man in particular is a particle of the diven Essence: consult AUGUSTINE, de Hæresibus, chapter XLVI, page 967a, b, and DANÆUS on the same place, page 970a; EPIPHANIUS, Hæresi LXVI, chapter IX, page 626. Thus

But, as the Socinians and Vorstius here pursue their finite and corporeal conception of God, and study to overthrow in this way the Essential identity of the divine Persons: so the Remonstrants, so that they might flatter the Socinians, in their Apologia, chapter II, page 41b, pronounce that the whole Question or disputation concerning the Simplicity of God is Metaphysical, concerning which there is not so much as one Jot in Scripture. They say that the most acute geniuses pa

That God is thus Simple and without any Composition, we hold, 1. against the Socinians, who depict to us a Composite God, when they assert that it is false that the divine Attributes are God Himself, with Slichtingius:[1] while the Eternity and faculties, by which God does whatever He wills, together with the acts of God, they maintain to be a means, or a third thing between God and His creatures, according to Adam Goslawski:[2] and they say that the Attributes do not destroy

Moreover, in this Single Essence there is no Real Composition, either of the Nature and Attributes, or of the Attributes among themselves. Real Composition, says our AUTHOR, while admitting in § 18 the Difference of the Reason Reasoned, whereby the Attributes are distinguished from the Essence according to the reckoning of the Objects and Effects, and according to our Manner of Conception, is also held to admit such a Composition of the Reason Reasoned according to our Manner

We are obliged, at last, to charge the Socinians, who set themselves above all other Christians as Unitarians, because they multiply Gods; since they call Jesus Christ True God, but nevertheless made by the Father, and altogether distinct from Him in Essence; but indeed a ψιλὸν ἄνθρωπον, mere man, who was not before he was born of the Virgin Mary; and, nevertheless, they thing that divine honors, of Adoration, for example, are also to be bestowed upon Him: compare SPANHEIM’S

This error of the Manicheans in the Third Century and thereafter was more well known than the others, that there are two eternal and opposite Principia, one of the good, the other of evil: in the assertion of which heresy a superabounding herd of Gnostics followed, who already in the Second Century were conversant with this opinion: see SPANHEIM’S Historiam Ecclesiasticam, Century III, chapter VII, § 5, columns 751-753; BUDDEUS’ Isagogen ad Theologiam universam, book II, chap

Neither is the Trinity any hindrance, β. to this Unity of Persons in One divine Essence. For the Trinity does not assert a divine Nature common to multiple Essences distinct in number; but this Trinity of Persons sweetly agrees and is conjoined with Unity of Essence, 1 John 5:7; see below, Chapter V, § 18: some also refer to this Deuteronomy 6:4; see Chapter V, § 19. Nor does it hinder, that three Persons among men also assert three men and three Essences diverse in number; i

Now, this Unity is not only Specific, just as many things that are actually plural are sometimes said to be One, to the extent that they are apt to come together in the conception of the same species. Thus with respect to species there is only one human nature, of which we are all partakers; while we nevertheless possess a human essence diverse from the singular number: but in God Numeric Unity obtains, in accordance with which His Being is so singular that it admits absolute

2. A posteriori, from the Stable Government of all things and Direction of them to One End; whence also one may gather the protection of One God as supreme King, just as previously from this our AUTHOR also proved the Existence of God, § 10: see IRENÆUS’ book III adversus Hæreses, chapter XXV or XLI-XLVI, pages 223, 224, where he disputes against Marcion:[1] also compare GROTIUS’ de Veritate Christianæ Religionis, book I, § 3. [1] Marcion (c. 85-160) was a Gnostic heretic fro

Simplicity follows, which again is a more Negative term, since one calls that Simple which is without composition; Positively it is called Unity, that is, the altogether perfect Unity of the Divine Essence and Attributes, excluding all Real Composition. The Unity of Essence is declared, α. by Sacred Scripture both positively and negatively, in the passages cited by our AUTHOR. β. Reason also demonstrates the same, 1. A priori, a. From Consummate Perfection. For, if you set up

Now, with all these Limitations of the divine Power passed over, or with certain of these omitted, which our AUTHOR set forth in this §, our AUTHOR says that CALVIN had good reason to detest the Absolute Power of God; that is, not in the sense in which our AUTHOR in § 21 distinguished the Absolute Power of God from the Actual, as God by His Absolute Power antecedently to every Decree is able to do a great many things that He is not able to fulfill by His Actual Power on accou

With this Independence of the divine Power not withstanding, nevertheless it is to be said that God is not able to do; not from any defect of Power, but rather from abundance of Perfection: 1. What things are opposed to His eternal Counsel: since that is Immutable, Isaiah 46:10; Psalm 33:11. Thus by the divine Decree many things are made Impossible to God, which, if you have regard to His absolute Power, are to be designated as altogether Possible; but, if these things should

To confirm what our AUTHOR asserts concerning the Absolute Power of God, he also appeals to Matthew 3:9, following many other Theologians, both Ancient and more Recent; see our AUTHOR’S Exercitationes Textuales XXVI, Part III, § 1, 2. Nevertheless, this argument for the Absolute Power of God, dealing with those things that are never done or are future, is denied by many others that either of old or in more recent times have expounded this text concerning that which actually h

This Power of God is divided into Actual and Absolute; from which distinction one and the same thing is able sometimes to be said to be possible and impossible to God. The Actual Power of God denotes the divine Sufficiency, insofar as by it what things by the eternal Decree were determined for the state of existence are actually created in the fullness of time; or it denotes the determination of the divine Virtue to actualize those certain sorts of possible things that God by

Then, γ. in the Faculties and Operations hence proceeding: since what in one regard is Independent is in every regard Independent; and the mode of operation follows upon the mode of being. Hence the divine Intellect is not instructed from another source; which here in advance our AUTHOR observes against the patrons of Middle or Conditional Knowledge, whereby God knows Free and Contingent Future Things conditionally before the Decree; which error our AUTHOR painstakingly refut

God is Independent, α. in Existence, whence He is said Necessarily to Exist. Which Necessary Existence of God we prove, 1. a priori, a. From the Infinite Perfection of God. For, what exists as infinitely Perfect exists necessarily; because the Necessity of existence is a simple and absolute Perfection. That is, what thing exists in such a way that it is not able not to exist is Necessary with respect to Existence. To this is opposed a Contingent thing; which exists in such a

Among the Incommunicable Attributes in the first place God’s Independence is treated. He is Independent, because He is of Himself sufficient unto Himself, in such a way that He requires nothing except Himself for His existence. And so, when we speak of God’s Independence, absolute Independence is to be understood, which removed dependence of every sort: but not relative Independence, which some observe in the order of creatures among themselves, and which only denies a certa