Zwingli and luther stated the reformation

[lori milne]

The sentences in blue were what Luther actually said.



I agree with you. Luther believed both in "no to free will" and in "yes to predestination."

I got it mixed up lol

 

[JM]

Wasteland!

 

[Architeuthus]

Ill use your quot to explain,
"all things whatever arise from and depend upon the Divine appointment, whereby it was preordained who should receive the word of life and who should disbelieve it, who should be delivered from their sins and who should be hardened in them, who should be justified and who condemned."
now the words " depend upon is clear but divine appointment is clearer, but he goes further to explain just in your qoute alone that their are clearly brethern who err from the faith and again with ""those that are delivered from sin" i will explain why they are relevent and absolutly against john Calvins theology.

I think that you misunderstand the Luther quote. The word "preordained" means "predestined," and Luther is saying that some are predestined to believe, while others are predestined to be hardened in their sins.

according to Luther it is for ALL men

His quote in blue shows that this is not true.

Luther tipped toed around it I think' just to avoid the attacks it brought and any one who claimed free will were attacked by the church as many lives were taken and wars were waged! bellow is a quote of luther in his Book bondage of the will

Luther's book does not "tiptoe." Luther had no need to "tiptoe." His book is a 100% attack on the doctrine of free will.

 

[lori milne]

I think that you misunderstand the Luther quote. The word "preordained" means "predestined," and Luther is saying that some are predestined to believe, while others are predestined to be hardened in their sins.
agreed preordained is clearly predestined no confusion.

His quote in blue shows that this is not true.
what i mean clearly that it is for ALL men but not all men come and I here is a quote of that same conversation in this book

Notice for example how Luther employs this distinction in one of his sermons on John 3:16. Addressing the type of person who says, "I am too great a sinner, and who knows whether I am predestined?" Luther responds by saying, "Look at these words ...'For God so loved the world,' and 'that whosoever believeth on him,' ...here no one is excluded. God's Son was given for all, all are asked to believe, and all who believe shall not be lost, etc." Luther is not arguing here that the whole world has been chosen, but rather that the offered promise extends to all men. Though we do not have access to the list of names in the Lamb's Book of Life, we do have access to the gospel promise which God has announced to the world through the proclamation of the gospel. "God has given us His Son, Jesus Christ," Luther writes, "daily we should think of Him and mirror ourselves in Him. There we shall discover the predestination of God and shall find it most beautiful."


Luther's book does not "tiptoe." Luther had no need to "tiptoe." His book is a 100% attack on the doctrine of free will.

You misunderstand what i mean by tip toe, Your correct the man is direct in his book, down write in his face and not ashamed AMEN!
i mean about his definition on free will and predestination it is put in a matter of words which i said I FEEL is tip toeing around directly disagreeing with Calvin.
which he does clearly. Calvinism is their is an elect that cant choose other wise and their are some that are not elect that cant choose other wise.
Luther believes all men are called and a few are chosen /come because they choose not to.

Luthers definition on free will : with out God man has no other choice but to have no eternal life ( no free will)
Thou makest all things move”; and our will, especially when it is evil, cannot of itself do good.

Gods for knowing is what takes mans free will away is his argument.
but also how religious, devout, and necessary a thing it is to know them. For if these things are not known, there can be neither faith nor any worship of God. For that would indeed be ignorance of God, and where there is such ignorance there cannot be salvation, as we know. For if you doubt or disdain to know that God foreknows all things, not contingently, but necessarily and immutably, how can you believe his promises and place a sure trust and reliance on them?

 

[lori milne]

Wasteland!

waste not want not

AMEN

 

[Architeuthus]

Luther believes all men are called and a few are chosen /come because they choose not to.

That is NOT what Luther believed.

Luther said "all things whatever arise from and depend upon the Divine appointment, whereby it was preordained who should receive the word of life and who should disbelieve it, who should be delivered from their sins and who should be hardened in them, who should be justified and who condemned."

That means some are predestined to believe, and some are predestined not to. Some are predestined to be delivered from their sins, and some are predestined to be hardened. Some are predestined to be justified, and some are predestined to be condemned.... which is also exactly what Calvin said.

 

[lori milne]

I know Calvinist theology is the elect is chosen by God only and not by man.
so if you want in to the faith or out of the faith you have no ability to do either.

the statement you've posted doesn't seem like that AT ALL..in fact it sounds like God knows are choices NOT makes are choices"their is a difference. as he used choices to explain his view. like " who should disbelieve' or who should believe"
this is a clear choice ALL men are faced with and should he believe or not decides his fate! and is a direction only HE can go. this is not GOD taking away the mans ability to possibly believe or not to believe other wise the writer wouldn't have phrased it like that.
he would have made a little less wordy and stuck to John Calvins ' Gods elect'
I see this view because 1. its also my own and I have seen it written out and posted it in this thread already twice.
he says if we have no free will then the bible its self is meaningless and Jesus dying on the cross would be for nothing/ but to draw all men that are already drawn?

"all things whatever arise from and depend upon the Divine appointment, whereby it was preordained who should receive the word of life and who should disbelieve it, who should be delivered from their sins and who should be hardened in them, who should be justified and who condemned."


Luther said what would the bible be needed for of Calvin is correct or the prophets jesus died on the cross for no reason it. would all be useless.

" ‘If I am predestined, I shall be saved, whether I do good or evil. If I am not predestined, I shall be condemned regardless of my works.’ . . . If the statements are true, as they, of course, think, then the incarnation of the Son of God, His suffering and resurrection, and all that He did for the salvation of the world are done away with completely. What will the prophets and all Holy Scripture help? What will the sacraments help"

he believed in predestination based off of God foreknowledge of mans choices

 

[Architeuthus]

he says if we have no free will then the bible its self is meaningless and Jesus dying on the cross would be for nothing/ but to draw all men that are already drawn?

Look, you are totally misunderstanding what Luther said. Luther did not believe in "free will," and wrote extensively against the idea.

If I am predestined, I shall be saved, whether I do good or evil. If I am not predestined, I shall be condemned regardless of my works

That quote is taken out of context from a defence of predestination by Luther.

he believed in predestination based off of God foreknowledge of mans choices

No he didn't. In fact, he writes "I frankly confess that, for myself, even if it could be, I should not want 'free-will' to be given me, nor anything to be left in my own hands to enable me to endeavour after salvation; not merely because in face of so many dangers, and adversities, and assaults of devils, I could not stand my ground and hold fast my 'free-will' ... even were there no dangers, adversities, or devils, I should still be forced to labour with no guarantee of success ... But now that God has taken my salvation out of the control of my own will, and put it under the control of his, and promised to save me, not according to my working or running, but according to his own grace and mercy, I have the comfortable certainty that he is faithful and will not lie to me, and that he is also great and powerful, so that no devils or opposition can break him or pluck me from him. ... Thus it is that, if not all, yet some, indeed many, are saved; whereas, by the power of 'free-will' none at all could be saved, but every one of us would perish."

"our salvation is not of our own strength or counsel, but depends on the working of God alone ... man’s will is like a beast standing between two riders. If God rides, it wills and goes where God wills. ... If Satan rides, it wills and goes where Satan wills. Nor may it choose to which rider it will run, or which it will seek; but the riders themselves fight to decide who shall have and hold it."

Some Later Lutherans may have believed in election based on foreseen faith, but Luther never did. This was part of the historical conflict between the Ohio and Missouri Synods.

 

[lori milne]

His writings say otherwise to me anyways? I'll have to some more reading and digging into this one friend

 

[WirSindBettler]

first the definitoin of Luthers idea of free will and predestination arent being presented clearly.
second its absolutely impossible to not believe in both free will and predestination they go hand and hand and cant any other way.

100% false.

if your predestined then you have no will to do anything about it?

Yep.

if you have no free will to turn away or err then your predestined?

Nope.

Luthers version of election was that ALL men were called and predestined but not all come'

100% false.

Scratch that. There isn't a number on the numerical scale for how false that is.

and was Gods will becuase he is for-knowing

100% false.

he made 2 points about free will
1. we have no free will in that God is for knowing and imputes his permissible will on all we've done then taking away are free will.

100% false.

2. we have two choices evil or good, if then being corrupted we are not able to with out GOD able to be righteous then taking away are will to choose.

100% false.

once receiving God he imputes his righteousness on us which if we have the TRUE Faith and with in his imputed righteousness we then again have no free will to choose evil.

100% false.

 

[WirSindBettler]

His writings say otherwise to me anyways? I'll have to some more reading and digging into this one friend

You should start with The Bondage of the Will. The most accurate English translation can be found in volume 33 of Luther's Works. Keep in mind you ought to read other works by Luther before hand, otherwise it's a rather dense and scholarly read. Then you can move on to On Being a Theologian of the Cross by Gerhard O. Forde (he's not confessional but the book is still good). Then, if you like that, you can read the actual Heidelberg Disputation, combined maybe with The Freedom of a Christian, the Leipzig Debate, and Luther's 1519 sermon Two Kinds of Righteousness. All four of these texts can be found in volume 31 of Luther's Works.

If you want to go into the actual Book of Concord (confessions), there's Article XVIII of the Augsburg Confession, Article XVIII of the Defense of the Augsburg Confession, Article II of the Epitome of the Formula of Concord, and Article II of the Solid Declaration of the Formula of Concord.

 

[lori milne]

Nice I'm obsessed with this stuff and can't seem to gy enough !

What did you think of this
Post of mine in regards to one of his quotes?

"all things whatever arise from and depend upon the Divine appointment, whereby it was preordained who should receive the word of life and who should disbelieve it, who should be delivered from their sins and who should be hardened in them, who should be justified and who condemned."

it sounds like he saying God knows are choices NOT makes are choices"
their is a difference. as he used choices to explain his view. like " who should disbelieve' or who should believe"
this is a clear choice ALL men are faced with and should he believe or not decides his fate! and is a direction only HE can go. this is not GOD taking away the mans ability to possibly believe or not to believe other wise the writer wouldn't have phrased it like that.
he would have made a little less wordy and stuck to John Calvins ' Gods elect'
I see this view onlynon definition difference.
Luther
he says if we have no free will then the bible its self is meaningless and Jesus dying on the cross would be for nothing/ but to draw all men that are already drawn?

Again
"all things whatever arise from and depend upon the Divine appointment, whereby it was preordained who should receive the word of life and who should disbelieve it, who should be delivered from their sins and who should be hardened in them, who should be justified and who condemned."[/QUOTE]

 

[lori milne]

Salvation: They were both monergists, meaning they believed God completely accomplishes our salvation - human choice and deeds play no role. Luther taught the the will was bound until Christians are spiritually regenerated, and thus grace is resistible. Calvin believed that free will was gone permanently because God is completely sovereign, and thus His grace is irresistible. They essentially agreed on predestination, but Calvin believed that Christ died only for the elect ("limited atonement"), while Luther believed that Christ died for all humanity. Luther taught what is often called single predestination, which essentially means that God predestines people to heaven, but no one is predestined to damnation. Calvin on the other hand taught double predestination, that God predestines people either to heaven or hell.

 

[lori milne]

http://christianity.stackexchange.c...rinal-disagreements-between-luther-and-calvin


Ha I was correct!!
This can't be mistaken

 

[lori milne]

100% false.



Yep.



Nope.



100% false.

Scratch that. There isn't a number on the numerical scale for how false that is.



100% false.



100% false.



100% false.



100% false.

End point Calvin and Luther had differnt definitions on free will and predestinaition.
I only see it cuz I believe Luthers theology you seem more like you believe Calvin more then Luther ??

 

[Architeuthus]

http://christianity.stackexchange.c...rinal-disagreements-between-luther-and-calvin

Ha I was correct!!
This can't be mistaken

Well, I'm not sure how reliable that is, but "They were both monergists, meaning they believed God completely accomplishes our salvation - human choice and deeds play no role" seems both clear and correct.

Both Luther and Calvin denied Free Will and supported predestination of the elect.

The big issue is so-called "double predestination." I don't think Calvin actually believed that in the sense that his critics used the term (Calvin said "none undeservedly perish, and that it is God's freely given kindness that some are released," which Luther would have agreed with). Calvin and his followers were always at pains to point out that "God is not the author of sin," and to distinguish between God's "predestination" of the elect and his "passing by" the non-elect.

Calvin and his later followers did write a lot about the topic, while Luther and his followers tended to view the predestination of the non-elect as a mystery best not inquired into too closely (Luther wrote "Why not rather let God keep His decisions and mysteries in secret? We have no reason to exert ourselves so much that these decisions and mysteries be revealed to us").

However, Luther was certainly a lot closer to Calvin on this issue than he is to most modern Lutherans.

 

[WirSindBettler]

I only see it cuz I believe Luthers theology you seem more like you believe Calvin more then Luther ??

First, you completely misunderstand Luther's theology in nearly everything you have posted so far, so I don't find it credible that you "believe" Luther's theology.

Second, I'm a Confessional Lutheran. My profile picture is of Martin Luther. My username is composed of Martin Luther's last words. I most certainly do not believe "Calvin more than Luther."

The will is free insofar as it is related to aspects of civil righteousness (things such as property). For example, I can choose to walk into your garage right now and steal your car, or I can choose not to. I have freedom of choice in this matter. However, this "freedom" in no way, shape, or form can be relegated to the sphere of spiritual righteousness, in which our will is bound either to Satan, or after regeneration, to God. I can do absolutely nothing to choose or follow God. In fact, everything within me wants very desperately not to. Instead, God takes me, cleanses me, gives me faith and saves me without me even being able to lift a finger.

You quite often confuse God's foreknowledge with his foreordination, which leads you much closer to Calvin than I am. We hear in Psalm 139:16 "Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them," and again, in Jeremiah 1:5 God says “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

Note that God's foreknowledge is separated from God's consecration.

Thus, while God predestines Christians to salvation, as referenced in Ephesians 1, he does not predestine non-Christians to damnation. Rather, they are damned as a result of their own fallen, bound will.

However, Luther was certainly a lot closer to Calvin on this issue than he is to most modern Lutherans.

What leads you to that conclusion, and what proof do you have to back it up?

 

[Architeuthus]

Thus, while God predestines Christians to salvation, as referenced in Ephesians 1, he does not predestine non-Christians to damnation. Rather, they are damned as a result of their own fallen, bound will.

Compare that to the classic hardline neo-Calvinist document, the Canons of Dort (from which the "five points" come):

What peculiarly tends to illustrate and recommend to us the eternal and unmerited grace of election, is the express testimony of sacred Scripture, that not all, but some only are elected, while others are passed by in the eternal election of God; whom God, out of his sovereign, most just, irreprehensible and unchangeable good pleasure, hath decreed to leave in the common misery into which they have willfully plunged themselves, and not to bestow upon them saving faith and the grace of conversion; but leaving them in his just judgment to follow their own ways, at last for the declaration of his justice, to condemn and punish them forever, not only on account of their unbelief, but also for all their other sins.

What leads you to that conclusion, and what proof do you have to back it up?

First, an apology, I should have said "many," not "most," because I know that the LCMS holds on strongly to what Luther believed.

And I was going largely by Australian Lutherans, some reading of Lutheran history, and some contact with the ELCA. One pastor quoted on elca.org says "Doesn’t God’s activity in response to knowledge of our choices effectively determine the outcomes, thereby predestining things? Well, yes and no. As I said, it’s complicated. This Lutheran – me happens to believe it’s immaterial. Complete predestination – no matter what I do or don’t do, the outcome is already fixed – can only lead to despair. Better to exercise the free will I believe God has given me, even if I find out it was an illusion, than to exercise no will at all, and find out I wasted a life full of opportunities."

The man who wrote On the Bondage of the Will would have disowned that, I'm sure.

 

[JM]

Well…we know the son of perdition was lost to fulfill scripture. Isaiah was sent on a preaching ministry to close the ears of his hearers, and shut their eyes to the truth. Isa. 6 Luther was uncomfortable with double predestination as dogma but the conclusion is scriptural and logical.

“Luther never taught any such doctrine as “single” predestination. The concept was clearly very foreign to him, as it required the suspension of God's sovereignty over the reprobation of man. Such a suspension to Luther was the “denial of Deity itself.”58 Luther understood that in terms of God's predestination, the principle is indeed "double or nothing." Either God is sovereign over all things which comes to pass, or He is not sovereign at all.” http://www.contra-mundum.org/essays/mattson/Luther-predestination.pdf

Yours in the Lord,

jm

 

[WirSindBettler]

And I was going largely by Australian Lutherans, some reading of Lutheran history, and some contact with the ELCA. One pastor quoted on elca.org says "Doesn’t God’s activity in response to knowledge of our choices effectively determine the outcomes, thereby predestining things? Well, yes and no. As I said, it’s complicated. This Lutheran – me happens to believe it’s immaterial. Complete predestination – no matter what I do or don’t do, the outcome is already fixed – can only lead to despair. Better to exercise the free will I believe God has given me, even if I find out it was an illusion, than to exercise no will at all, and find out I wasted a life full of opportunities."

Hopefully I'm not breaking any forum rules by saying this, but my denomination (the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod), and all other Confessional Lutheran churches do not consider the ELCA to be Lutheran.