Light and Shadow

Confessing the Doctrine of Election in the Sixteenth Century

An Analysis of Reformed Symbolic documents in the Light of

Article XI of the Formula of Concord

A Research Paper For

Seminar on The Formula of Concord (S-824)

Professor Robert Kolb

By

Jeffrey J. Meyers

St. Louis, MO – May 20, 1997

The Lutheran churches of the sixteenth century offered no explicit treatment of the doctrine of election in their confessional documents until Article XI in the Formula of Concord (1577). Reformed churches, on the other hand, began incorporating this doctrine in their confessions and catechisms early on.[1] When the Lutheran church did come to confess election was it substantially different than the Reformed confessional understanding of the doctrine? How do the two ways of confessing the doctrine of election compare? Specifically, are the concerns of the Formula’s Article XI directed at the Reformed confessions and catechisms? Without conducting a detailed historical investigation into the actual intentions of the Formula’s authors (whether they had Reformed theologians and/or symbolic documents in mind), we might nevertheless profitably ask if the pastoral and theological concerns addressed by the Lutherans in this article apply to the Reformed church’s way of confessing predestination and election. Answering this question would necessarily involve a careful examination of the texts of the Reformed symbolic documents in the light of the concerns articulated in the Formula of Concord. This essay attempts to do just that. I will examine the doctrine of election as confessed in the Reformed symbolic documents of the sixteenth-century confessions and catechisms in order to determine continuities and discontinuities between the Lutheran and Reformed ways of confessing election.

My thesis is that there was no substantial difference in theological content between the two ways of publicly confessing the doctrine in the sixteenth century.[2] Reformed confessions and catechisms treat the doctrine of election positively as the light that illumines the reality of the experience of salvation, thereby grounding the Reformation doctrine of justification sola gratia in God’s eternal counsel.[3] The shadow of preterition (or reprobation), however, finds little or no place in the Reformed church’s public confession of the Gospel. The article of election might have any number of minor uses or functions within the system of Christian doctrine, nevertheless, its fundamental confessional function involves illuminating and thereby anchoring the central Reformation confession of justification in God’s eternal purpose. Election is confessed in both Lutheran and Reformed communions as the flip side of sola gratia, or better, election is a way of confessing the Gospel of grace from the perspective of eternity.

The analysis will proceed in three stages. First, I will expound the fundamental concerns of Article XI of the Formula. Second, the sixteenth-century Reformed Confessions and catechisms must be analyzed carefully to discover the shape and content of the doctrine of election as confessed by Reformed churches. Finally, I will compare and contrast the Formula’s Article XI with the confessional doctrine of election discovered in the Reformed symbolic documents, highlighting areas of continuity and discontinuity between the Lutheran and Reformed way of confessing the doctrine of election.

The Burden of the Formula of Concord on Election

The Formula offers four stated reasons for including this article. First, the doctrine of election “has become the occasion of very serious controversies at other places and has involved our people also” (SD XI, 1).[4] It is not entirely clear what these “other places” are. There may not have been any “public dissension” on this article among the theologians of the Augsburg Confession (SD XI, 1), but there was at least one not entirely private dispute between Luther and Amsdorf.[5] Amsdorf taught a rather symmetrical version of “double predestination,” which Luther and others rejected. In addition to this, we do know of at least three general disputes over the doctrine of election in “other places” that might qualify as illuminating background for the content of this article. Surely the synergistic controversy with the so-called Philippists is one dispute that underlies the concern in this article to deny any determinative role to human choice in one’s salvation (EP XI, 5, 15, 20; SD XI, 23, 30, 31, 43-44).[6]

Moreover, the various tract wars fought by Calvin, Beza, and other Reformed theologians against such dissenting voices as Bolsec and Pighius may also have been in view. Calvin published his Consensus pastorum Genevensis ecclesiae in 1552, an extensive exposition of his doctrine of election which culminated a decade or so of debate with Pighius, Bolsec, and Georgius.[7] These debates were surely known among the Lutheran theologians. Calvin’s own Institutes had gone through six editions, the last published in 1559, and contained a full exposition of his doctrine of election.[8] In addition to this, Jacob Andreae and Calvin’s successor Theodore Beza had faced off at the colloquy of Poissy in 1561. The doctrine of predestination was not really an issue at Poissy, but as Jill Raitt notes, “From this point on Andreae and Beza became more and more inimical, especially through the battle for the Palatinate . . .”[9] We should take note, however, that the Formula makes no explicit mention of Calvinism or Reformed theology, so one must be careful about identifying the precise objects under attack. Three of the four antitheses, however, in the Formula’s Epitome reject some form or another of soteriological particularism (EP XI, 17-19; cf. SD XI, ), so it is reasonable to assume that the predestinarian particularism of Calvinism (at least as it was perceived by the authors of the Formula) provides the background for these passages that highlight God’s universal will and grace. Nevertheless, my investigation in this essay will seek to determine whether the public, ecclesiastical Reformed confessions and catechisms in particular might have been in view. Would the way in which the doctrine of election was confessed in these Reformed symbolic texts lead to the kind of polemical statements that we find in Article XI of the Formula?

Finally, Strasbourg is another one of these “other places” where controversy broke out over this issue. Just a little more than a dozen years before the Formula was written a serious dispute over predestination broke out between the Reformed theologian Jerome Zanchi and the Lutheran pastor Marbach. This particular theological altercation focused on Zanchi’s scholastic doctrine of predestination, which Marbach found particularly destructive to pastoral care. This bitter debate ended with the Strasbourg Concord (1563), a document written in part by Andreae and Brenz, which Zanchi signed with serious reservations. This incident no doubt alerted the Lutheran theologians to the potential pastoral problems associated with an errant or even a badly skewed doctrine of election.[10]

The three other reasons stated for the inclusion of this article are the desire to 1) standardize theological terminology among Lutheran theologians, 2) make the church’s position on election public and explicit “so that all men may know what we teach, believe, and confess in this article” (SD XI, 2), and 2) set forth the true biblical doctrine “precisely in order to avert such misuse and misunderstanding, we must set forth the correct meaning on the basis of Scripture” (SD XI, 3). Underlying each of these four expressed reasons stands the deep pastoral concern that pervades the Formula’s careful treatment of this doctrine. The Formula’s treatment is more concerned with outlining a basic evangelical and pastoral shape or context for the doctrine of election than with articulating a definitive body of teaching on the subject. The depth of this pastoral concern can be seen by summarizing the content of the article.

First, Article XI traces the outlines of an important distinction between God’s Lordship over evil and his gracious election of his people (EP XI, 1-4; SD XI, 4-7). Although God is Lord over all that happens, including good and evil, he does not originate or cause evil and wickedness as he does the salvation of his people in Christ. Sin is not produced or authored by God (EP XI, 3; SD XI, 79-86). This accounts for the concern to distinguish between foreknowledge and predestination as an explanation of God’s asymmetrical relation to sin, evil, and damnation and salvation (EP XI, 2-5; SD XI, 4-8). The Formula does not even attempt to explicate a more comprehensive “general” doctrine of predestination. The article is silent about the cosmological or philosophical possibilities in this doctrine. The fundamentally asymmetrical nature of God’s work can also be seen in the strong language used in Art. XI to describe the proper positive doctrine of the Christian’s eternal election. Referencing Matt. 6:18, John 10:20, and Acts 3:48, the Solid Declaration ascribes to the positive doctrine of election unto salvation everything it denies to reprobation: “God’s eternal election, however, not only foresees and foreknows the salvation of the elect, but by God’s gracious will and pleasure in Christ it is also a cause [eine Ursach] which creates, effects, helps, and advances [schaffert, wirket, hilft und befurdert] our salvation and whatever pertains to it” (SD XI, 8).[11] Theologically, then, God’s dealings with man are fundamentally asymmetrical. Because God does not work evil desires in man in the same manner (eodem modo) as he works salvation in his people, the church’s doctrine of election must not press logical connections in order to arrive at a nice symmetrical doctrine of predestination. The Formula eschews all attempts to penetrate or concatenate the various disparate elements so evident in the Scriptural expression of this doctrine. The church’s confession of election will always manifest the paradox of this doctrine’s inherent mystery, the inexplicable cur alii, alii non.[12]

Second, in light of this emphasis on directing Christians to the revealed will of God in the Gospel of Christ, Art. XI warns against speculative forays into the “secret and inscrutable counsel of God” (EP XI, 5-7; SD XI, 9). The example given makes God’s will intolerably arbitrary, like a “military muster,” choosing one person and passing by another. Count off by 4’s and every one with an even number will be saved. This reduces God’s eternal counsel to a mathematical or statistical nightmare. “This one shall be saved, that one shall be damned, this one shall persevere, that one shall not persevere.”

“Hence if we wish to think or speak correctly and profitably about eternal election or about the predestination and ordering of the children of God to eternal life, we should accustom ourselves not to speculate concerning the absolute, secret, hidden, and inscrutable foreknowledge of God. On the contrary, we should consider the counsel, purpose, and ordinance of God in Christ Jesus, who is the genuine and true ‘book of life’ as it is revealed to us through the Word” (SD XI, 13).

This means that we should keep together the “entire teaching” (die ganze Lehre) concerning the purpose, counsel, will and ordinance of God relating to our redemption, just as Paul does in Romans 8 and Ephesians 1.[13] Our thinking about election should be organized around the eight points of doctrine outlined in SD XI, 15-22. It is only in this “light” that the doctrine of election should be considered (SD XI, 24). The solution to man’s tendency to reduce God’s eternal mind and will to man’s puny proportions through fruitless speculation is always to think of the entire doctrine of God’s purpose and counsel (predestination) Christologically and soteriologically.

Third, Article XI eschews all formulations of the doctrine of election that would evacuate its ability to comfort individual Christians concerning God’s gracious and infallible will concerning their salvation (SD XI, 23, 43-49, 91-93). Thus, God’s eternal purpose is not merely to make salvation possible or to make it available to all in general; on the contrary, he has specifically “elected to salvation each and every person among the elect [alle und jede Personen der Auserwählten]” (SD XI, 23).[14] The question of the identity of the elect must be carefully considered. Since the doctrine of election ought to comfort the elect, the questions “who are the elect?” and “wherefrom and whereby can and should one discover [one’s election]?” become acute. The Formula answers these questions by warning against making judgments based on the law, reason, outward appearance, or especially any attempt “to investigate [forschen] the secret and hidden abyss of divine foreknowledge [den heimlichen, verborgenen Abrund götlicher Vorsehung]” (SD XI, 26).[15] Rather than leading us into the dark, hidden depths of God’s being, the doctrine of election stands behind the revealed will of God in Christ (Eph. 1:9, 10). Therefore, assurance of our election comes through the call of the Gospel (SD XI, 27-29). For this reason, the Formula is concerned to direct believers to the “revealed will of God” for certain knowledge of his will. Theologically, if believers cannot trust God’s intentions in the Gospel, then God must be deceiving us or contradicting himself (SD XI, 34-35). Both possibilities are intolerable. God’s intention is accurately revealed in his Word and Sacrament. If God has two wills, two intentions, one secret and one revealed, how will we know with “absolute certainty” that God loves us in Christ? (see EP XI, 17-19). This means that there can be no deception in God’s Gospel call—it goes out freely and sincerely to all. The elect are those, according to God’s decree, who “hear the Gospel, believe on Christ, pray, give thanks, are sanctified in love, have hope, patience, and comfort in afflictions (Eph. 1:11, 13; Rom. 8:25)” (SD XI, 30).

Fourth and finally, the Formula makes it abundantly evident that the doctrine of election is a corollary to and ground for the mercy of God in Christ revealed in the Gospel. The doctrine of election can only be understood as an evangelical doctrine. In paragraphs 43 through 51, the Formula outlines 4 major and two minor “uses” for the doctrine of God’s eternal foreknowledge or election. There is a nice inclusio in paragraph 51 that ties these six “uses”—altogether eight paragraphs—together: “Thus it is possible to use the teaching in this article in a profitable, comforting, and salutary way [nützlich, tröstlich, und seliglich]” (SD XI, 51).[16] Use #1: Most importantly, God has revealed the mystery of foreknowledge as powerful support for the central article of justification by grace through faith. Citing Eph. 1:4, Rom. 9:11, and 2 Tim. 1:9, the Formula explains that election “is indeed a useful, salutary, and comforting doctrine [nützliche, heilsame, tröstliche Lehre], for it mightily confirms [gewaltig bestätigen] the article that we are justified and saved without our works and merit, purely by grace and solely for Christ’s sake” (SD XI, 43; BS 1076, 36-38). Use #2: The doctrine of election overturns all false doctrines about “the powers of the natural will [von der Kräften unsers natürlichen Willens]” (SD XI, 44).[17] Use #3: This doctrine is designed to afford “beautiful and glorious comfort” to individual Christians. They can know that nothing will separate them from the love of God in Christ (Rom. 8:35) since God has ordained their salvation in his eternal purpose even before the foundation of the world. Use #4: The Christian can find the assurance of his election especially comforting during times of trial and affliction. Here the Formula derives a very practical use from the Christological orientation of election. Referencing Romans 8, the doctrine of election ought to comfort us in our trials, reminding us that we are “predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son,” persevering through cross and affliction as he did. Use #5: The doctrine of election assures us that the Church of God will endure against all odds and in spite of “the outward prestige of the false church” (SD XI, 50). A sixth use is noted, but not explained. The article of election, according to such passages as Luke 7:30, 4:24, and Matt. 22:14, “contains strong admonitions and warnings [mächtige Vermahnungen und Warnungen]” (SD XI, 51).[18] In outlining these six uses of the doctrine the Formula intends to highlight the inseparable organic relationship between the doctrine of election and the foundational doctrine of the justification. Any use of election that strays from its connection with the Gospel becomes an improper and dangerously unbiblical use.

We can conclude our review of Article XI’s chief concerns with eight summary points. In confessing the biblical teaching of election the Formula seeks to 1) provide the outline of a biblical and pastorally sensitive doctrine of election; 2) champion the Gospel context and ground of the doctrine of election as a objective substructure of justification and sola fide; 3) guard the asymmetrical character of God’s dealings with men; 4) repudiate God’s causal complicity with sin and evil by denying that God is the author of evil or the cause of damnation; 5) explain election as God’s gracious, eternal choice of individuals for salvation in Christ in such a way that would comfort Christians in times of doubt and temptation; 6) uphold the sincerity and universality of God’s love for all mankind, Christ’s atonement, and the Gospel’s free offer of salvation; 7) deny any contribution to salvation from man’s works or will (contra synergism); and 8) warn against speculative investigations into God’s will outside of Christ and his revealed Word;

These eight points must now be turned into questions and directed to the sixteenth-century Reformed confessions and catechisms. Do the Reformed symbolic documents exhibit the same considerations when confessing the doctrine of election? Do they ignore or possibly violate any of the Formula’s evangelical concerns. Do they confess a doctrine of election that is fundamentally at odds with the shape and content of the doctrine summarized in the Formula? Is election cut loose from Christology and justification in the Reformed symbols? The texts of these pre-Concord, sixteenth-century symbolic documents must now be examined and analyzed.

Election as Confessed in the Reformed Symbolic Documents

In this essay we are not particularly interested in each of the Reformer’s “extended” or “general” doctrine of election, but rather in the evangelical publication of the doctrine as it is confessed in their ecclesiastical confessions and catechisms. Our goal is to ascertain the way in which the doctrine of election was publicly confessed by the Reformed church, not how it was taught or argued. Consequently, we will avoid detailed analyses of each particular Reformer’s doctrine of election as he might have expounded it in lectures, books, or polemical tracts apart from the churchly confessions and catechisms. For our purposes, these works will be used only occasionally to help illumine otherwise opaque passages in the symbolic texts. Our method will be to introduce each confession or catechism briefly, cite all the relevant passages that touch on the doctrine of the election, and make expository comments relevant to our goal of comparing the Lutheran and Reformed ways of confessing election.[19]

The first distinctively “Reformed” confessions begin with the symbolic works of Zwingli and those allied with him in the Swiss Reformation. None of Zwingli’s four ecclesiastical writings, however, give election any special prominence, and no extended treatment is given to explicating that doctrine.[20] Allusions to the reality of election do appear in the later two larger works (Fidei ratio [1530] and Expositio fidei christianae [1531]), especially in connection with the treatment of the fall, redemption, and the nature of the church—sensitive topics central to Zwingli’s apologetic battle with Rome—but even there election is primarily discussed using the terminology of Scripture with little or no explicit theological exposition.

In 1530 Zwingli presented a confession to the emperor at the Diet of Augsburg. He sent his Fidei ratio to Charles V as a concise summary of the Zurich church’s confession of faith. The doctrine of election finds no separate treatment. The first mention of foreordination is found in connection with his article on God.

I know that that Supreme Divinity who is my God has freely made appointment concerning all things [libere constituere de rebus universis], so that his counsel does not depend on the occasioning of any creature, since it is peculiar to marred human wisdom to reach a decision because of a preceding discussion or example. But God, who from eternity to eternity knows all that is with a single and simple regard [qui ab aeterno usque in sempiternum universaa unico et simplici intuitu inspicit], has no need of any ratiocination, or expectation of acts, but, equally wise, prudent, and good, freely determines and disposes concerning all things [libere constituit ac disponit de rebus universis]—seeing that all that exists is His. Therefore, though He knowingly and purposely in the beginning made the man who should fall, He yet equally determined to clothe His own Son in human nature, that he might repair the fall [Hinc est, ut quamvis sciens ac prudens hominem principio formaret qui lapsurus erat, aeque tamen constitueret filium suum humaua natura amicire, qui lapsum repararet].[21]

What at first glance looks like a general, cosmological doctrine of predestination actually turns out to be an expression of the believer’s personal trust in a gracious Father to order (constituere) all things, especially (note the connecting “therefore” in the last sentence) his determination of the incarnation of his Son to repair the fall of man. Zwingli does not speak of God’s determining (constituere) the fall of man, but of his “knowingly and purposefully [sciens ac prudens] making the man who should fall.” God is not the cause of man’s fall, his determination comes in as consequence of the fall in order to repair it. This is how Zwingli puts it:

Then, when the time came to reveal his goodness, which he had determined from eternity to display no less than his justice, God sent his Son to assume our nature in every part, except as far as it inclined to sin, in order that, being our brother and equal, he could be a mediator, to make a sacrifice for us to divine justice, which must remain holy and inviolate, no less than his goodness. Thereby the world might be sure both of the appeasing of the justice and the presence of the goodness of God. For since he has given his Son to us and for us, how will he not with him and because of him give us all things? What is it that we ought not to promise ourselves from him, who so far humbled himself as not only to be our equal but also to be altogether ours? Who can sufficiently marvel at the riches and grace of the divine goodness, whereby he so loved the world, that is, the human race, as to give up his Son for its life. This I regard as the heart and life of the Gospel [hos Evangelii fontes ac venas esse duco]; this is the only medicine for the fainting soul, whereby it is restored to God and itself. For none but God himself can give it the assurance of God’s grace.[22]

This paragraph outlines a thoroughly Trinitarian and evangelical doctrine of God’s “determination” from all eternity. Zwingli stresses the riches of God’s goodness such that his justice serves his beneficent design for human nature. The overflow of his goodness resulted in his determination to send his Son to be our “brother and equal.” The Christological matrix of Zwingli’s doctrine of God’s eternal determination stands out from the outset. God has, from all eternity, determined to send his Son to save the world. As the next paragraph proves, the election of God serves the doctrine of sola gratia and sola fide.

Hence there is left neither justification nor satisfaction based on our works, nor any expiation nor intercession of the saints, whether on earth or in heaven, for those who live by the mercy of God. For this is the one sole mediator between God and men, the God-man Christ Jesus. The election of God, however, stands and remains firm, since those whom He elected before the constitution of the world He so elected as to choose to himself through his Son; for he is holy and just as he is good and merciful. All his works therefore savor of mercy and justice. Election therefore properly savors of both. It is of his goodness that he has elected whom he will; but it is of his justice that he has adopted his elect to himself and joined them to him through his Son as a victim offered to satisfy Divine justice for us. . .[23]

Election is single. God has elected us before the constitution of the world “through his Son” as an expression of his holiness, justice, goodness, and mercy. There is no hint of a decree of reprobation or an ordination unto wrath. Election serves to heighten and objectify the grace of God and ground the sacrifice of the cross in his eternal counsels. Election is expounded in terms of Christology since it is understood as the gracious activity of God in Christ.

Finally, Zwingli’s Ratio Fidei also briefly treats election in the course of explaining the nature of the church. Here again, election is single not symmetrically double, unto salvation without mention of any causal determination to damnation. We should also note that, according to Zwingli, one comes to the assurance of one’s election by faith. One may not always be sure about another’s election, but one can be certain that he is elected by God through the ministry of the Spirit who enables us to call upon God as our Father. There is nothing speculative, philosophical, or deterministic about Zwingli’s doctrine. Neither does it immobilize anyone by causing them to doubt their election. Believe and you may be certain of your election.

Of the Church, then, we think as follows: The term Church is variously used in Scriptures. For those elect ones whom God has destined to eternal life. It is concerning this Church that Paul speaks when he says that it has no spot or wrinkle. This Church is known to God alone; for he only, according to the word of Solomon, knows the hearts of the sons of men. But, nevertheless, those who are members of this church know themselves, since they have faith, to be elect and members of this first Church; but they are ignorant with regard to other members. For it is thus written in the Acts: “And as many as were ordained to eternal life believed” [Acts 13:48]. Those, then, who believe are ordained to eternal life. But who truly believes no one knows but the one who believes. He then is certain that he is elected of God. For according to the word of the Apostle, he has the Spirit as a pledge, by whom he is sponsored and sealed, and knows himself to be free and made a son of the family and not a slave. For that Spirit cannot deceive. As He declares God to be our Father, we call upon Him as Father with assurance and boldness, being firmly persuaded that we shall obtain eternal inheritance because we are sure that the Spirit of God has been poured out into our hearts. It is certain, then, that we shall obtain an eternal inheritance because we are sure that the Spirit of God has been poured out into our hearts; for those who believe are ordained to eternal life.[24]

Telling references to election appear in connection with Zwingli’s treatment of Good Works in his posthumously published semi-symbolic confession Expositio fidei christianae (1531). The Reformation conviction of sola gratia must be defended against every foreign incursion of merit, especially in the church’s doctrine of good works. Here election functions as a safeguard against any possible synergistic misunderstanding. In his article “On faith and works” he writes:

It is therefore by the grace and goodness of God alone, which He has abundantly poured out on us in Christ, that eternal bliss is attained. What, then, shall we say of the passage of Scripture adduced above, in which a reward is promised for a draught of cold water and the like? This to wit: That the election of God is free and gratuitous [Electionem dei liberalem esse ac gratuuitam]; for He elected us before the constitution of the world, before we were born. God therefore did not elect us on account of works, but he elected us before the creation of the world. Our works therefore have no merit. But when he promises a reward for works it is after the manner of human speech; “for,” says Augustine, “what wilt Thou, O good God, remunerate except Thine own work? For since it is Thou that workest in us both the willing and the doing, what is left for us to claim for ourselves?”[25]

Bucer, aided by Capito and Hedio, in great haste produced the so-called Tetrapolitan Confession of 1530 as an expression of the faith of the four imperial cities (Strasbourg, Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau) to be presented at the Diet of Augsburg. The document seeks a via media between Luther and Zwingli. It is the first attempt by Bucer to compose an “evangelical union symbol.”[26] In its twenty-three chapters only once (Art. IV, Of Good Works) is mention made of foreknowledge and predestination, and there it is merely a conflated quotation of Romans 8:29 and Ephesians 2:9. Nevertheless, in Article III (Of Justification and Faith) the Gospel is given a firm grounding in the work of the Father’s drawing, the Son’s revealing, and Holy Spirit’s regenerating. The words foreknowledge, election, and predestination are not mentioned, but the evangelical understanding that “salvation is of the Lord” is prominent.

For since it is our righteousness and eternal life to know God and our Savior, Jesus Christ; and it is so impossible for this to be the work of flesh and blood that it is needful for it to be born anew; and we cannot come to the Son except by the Father’s drawing, nor know the Father except by the Son’s revelation; and Paul has written so expressly that it is not of us nor of works—it is evident enough that our works can help nothing toward our becoming righteous from the unrighteous ones which we were born; because as we are by nature the children of wrath, and on this account unrighteous, so we are unable to do anything just or pleasing to God. But the beginning of all our righteousness and salvation must proceed from the mercy of the Lord, who from his own favor and the contemplation of the death of his Son first offers the doctrine of truth and his Gospel, those being sent forth who are to preach it; and, secondly, since “the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit,”, he causes a beam of his light to arise at the same time in the darkness of our heart, so that now we may believe his Gospel preached, being persuaded of the truth thereof by his Spirit from above, and then, relying upon the testimony of this Spirit, may call upon him with filial confidence and say, “Aba, Father,” obtaining thereby sure salvation, according to the saying: “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”[27]

The First Confession of Basel (1534), composed by Oecolampadius and Myconius, was the first Reformed confession to contain a separate paragraph on election. This confession was published by Council of Basel with a preface by the bürgermeister on January 21, 1534 It is essentially the work of Oecolampadius, being revised upon his death in 1531, by his successor, Oswald Myconius. The confession consists of twelve short articles in the following order: God, Man, God’s Care for Us, Christ, the Church, the Lord’s Supper, Excommunication, Church Polity, Faith and Works, Judgment Day, Adiophora, and Against the Error of the Anabaptists. The first article (Of God) contains a single sentence paragraph confessing the doctrine of election.

We believe in God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, one holy, divine Trinity, three Persons and one single, eternal, almighty God, in essence and substance, and not three gods. We also believe that God has created all things by His eternal Word, that is, by his only begotten Son, and preserves and strengthens all things by his Spirit, that is by his power; and therefore, God sustains and governs all things as he created them.

Hence we confess that before he created the world God elected all those whom he willed to bestow the inheritance of eternal salvation [Dannenhar bekennend wir das Gott vor und ee er die welt erschaffen, alle die erwölt habe, die er mit dem erb ewiger seligkeit begaben will]. Scripture texts: Rom. 8:29, 30; 9:11-13; Eph. 1:4-6.[28]

Since this statement offers little more than a restatement of key biblical phrases, it cannot possibly be misunderstood as setting out a deterministic conception of God—even if the doctrine is subsumed under the article on God. Election is not confessed here philosophically or cosmologically. Neither does it flow out of the doctrine of God as a metaphysical, logical deduction as in some forms of medieval and seventeenth-century Reformed scholasticism. On the contrary, It is interesting to note that it is directly tied to the Trinitarian confession of that precedes it. The Triune God himself is the God who elects to bestow eternal salvation. The same Father who created through his Son and preserves and sustains all things by the Spirit—this God has elected from all eternity the inheritors of eternal salvation. Eternal salvation is thereby anchored in the gracious freedom of the Triune God of creation. No mention is made of reprobation or damnation. The soteriological purpose of the doctrine of election is prominent.

The First Bohemian Confession (1535), authored by John Augusta (d. 1572) and revised at Luther’s suggestion, was presented to King Ferdinand. Although he rejected it, this confession became the symbolic formula for the Polish Calvinists and the exiled Bohemian Brethren in Poland (1555).[29] The article defining justification (Art. VI) briefly denies the possibility that “one can have this faith by his own power, will or choice; since it is the gift of God who, where and when it seems good to Him, works it in man through the Holy Spirit.”[30] Predestination and election are not discussed in this confession.

At a diet held in Prague in 1575, a second Bohemian Confession was presented to Emperor Maximilian II (1564-1576), who thereupon promised the Lutherans, Calvinists, and Brethren religious liberty. McNeill describes this document as “Melanchthonian rather than typically Calvinist.”[31] Nevertheless, it was received by the Bohemian Calvinists as an accurate statement of faith. The people of God are designated “elect” in the Second Confession in connection with the discussion on the nature of the Church. The elect children of God are those “true and faithful Christians, all of whom as a whole and without exception are holy with a holiness imputed in Christ and begun in them by the Holy Spirit; and these only God deigns to call his sheep. . .”[32]

What we now call the First Helvetic Confession of 1536, has also been called the Second Confession of Basel. The Confession was written up by the committee of Bullinger, Grynaeus, Myconius, Judae, and Megander appointed by the conference of Swiss Reformed delegates who met at Basel on January 20, 1536, in order to prepare for the Pope’s own announced general council scheduled to meet in Mantua in 1537. Bucer and Capito, although not part of the committee, assisted in the composition of the twenty-seven articles of the confession, especially the article on the Lord’s Supper. These two especially had high hopes to further doctrinal concord between Luther and the Swiss churches, and so were anxious to frame a confession that would unite the churches in their common faith. Articles 9-11 of the First Helvetic Confession are relevant to our investigation.

Article 9. Free Will. We ascribe free will to man because we discover (experimur) in ourselves that we do good and evil knowingly and deliberately. We are able to do evil of ourselves but we can neither embrace nor fulfill the good unless we are illumined, quickened and impelled by the grace of Christ. For God is the one who effects in us the willing and the doing, according to his good pleasure. Our salvation is from God, but from ourselves there is nothing but sin and damnation (us gott ist unnser heyl, us uns aber jst nüt dann sünd und verdampnus).[33]

While synergism is denied in this article, a radical monergism that traces back to God every act of man, including his sin and evil, is definitively denied. The doctrine of man’s will is treated in an evangelical way. Man is responsible for his own acts, while God is solely responsible for man’s salvation. No attempt is made logically to penetrate philosophical and cosmological questions about causality that might arise because of this paradoxical way of confessing God’s free agency in salvation.

Article 10. How God has saved man through his eternal counsel [durch sin Ewigen Ratschlag]. Although man through his own guilt and transgression justly incurs eternal damnation and has come under the righteous wrath of God, yet God, the gracious Father, has never ceased to be concerned about him. We can perceive and understand this sufficiently, clearly and plainly from the first promise and from the whole law by which sin is awakened through not wiped out, and from Christ the Lord who was appointed and given for that purpose.[34]

This article introduces the “eternal counsel” of God for man’s salvation. Man is saved through God’s eternal co