Originally posted by Ianterrell
Firstly let me say that not all FV writers and teachers have the same view of the state of Adam. So so clarification is needed on Dr. Clark's part to provide, at least some names.
I have in the past, but I find it tends to distract folk from the issues at hand. We "named names" during the Justification Conference and we do also interact at length with virtually every FV author in the forthcoming book. I recognize that the FV is a loose affiliation of likeminded folk. I tried to communicate that fact, but this is email, not a published monograph.
Second, the perspective on the original covenant between God and Adam which has been presented here is slippery. Dr. Clark fails to demonstrate how it is that the Gracious version of the Adamic Covenant necessarily has direct link with the Roman Catholic's "grace" to begin with.
My contention (what constitutes "demonstration" in this context?) is that both the FV and Rome share basic assumptions. Jordan and Barach's "maturity" seems indistinguishable from the traditional medieval view.
He assumes that the mention of grace in the original covenant means that it is similar, but the gracious rendition found in the writings of James Jordan and others bears very little substantial resemblence.
Have you read Thomas' account of the donum super additum? Do you understand what he said and why? I contend that the theological (not personal) motives are remarkably similar. I address this below.
Plenty of respectable Reformed theologians are comfortable with calling the original covenant gracious (John Murray, G.I. Williamson etc), and not merely as a concession.
As I have pointed out many times before, this is a 20th century anomaly. Prior to the 20th century virtually no confessional Reformed theologian was willing to speak this way (of a gracious prelapsarian covenenant). There was a minority among the British Reformed and I can't think of any on the continent.
It seems strange that we should leverage and entire tradition with a handful of modern writers, however reputable. Why do they automatically superscede Witsius, Turretin, Polanus, Wollebius and the writers of our confessional documents?
The attempt to associate Murray with the FV fails on the face of it. Yes, Murray had qualms about the covenant of works, but he would never accepted the notions of "maturity" (in place of merit) or baptismal union with Christ, temporary faith, temporary union, temporary justification etc.
Murray was a strong and unequivocal champion of the historic doctrine of justification on the ground of the imputation of the active obedience, a notion flatly repudiated by a number of FV writers.
Murry knew nothing of the FV doctrine of faith in the act of justification as "faithfulness." Finally, he was unequivocal about the necessity of the distinction between law and gospel which every FV writer I've read regards as a solely "Lutheran" idea.
The gracious CoW view has no super-added grace because they share the Reformed view of Adam's nature prefall.This being the case they cannot share more than the most superficial similarities with the RC view. If anyone feels that the mere mention of grace in Adam's relation with God still sounds RC at this point...then I can't help you.
Inherent in the notion of maturity rather than the legal notion of merit is the idea that Adam was lacking something. This notion that Adam was defective, hence in need of maturity in order to enter consummation is grounded in the same neo-Platonic (Plotinian) scheme that under girds the Roman doctrine of salvation from nature.
This is precisely why our confessions say that Adam was "righteous" (notice they don't say "immature") and "holy" (they don't say he was defiled). What God established was a legal test that Adam was qualified and able to pass by virtue of his creation. He wasn't needy. We might say God freely and even graciously made the covenant of works, but as a legal, probation (which is a notion held almost universally in the church since the earliest fathers) grace cannot be rightly said to be involved.
This is why, as I've said repeatedly to all who will listen, the divines did NOT use the word "grace" to describe the covenant of works. They said "voluntary condescension." They turned not to our lack of divinity or lack of maturity but to God's free will in establishing a legal test.
What Jordan and others do not seem to realize is the theological consequences of setting up a gracious covenant of works. First it's an oxymoron. Second, it conflates grace and works. Third, it jeopardizes the legal and meritorious work of Christ for us.
The truth is that, having been influenced by the modern turn away from the legal in favor of relational categories, some of our pastors and theologians have flatly and publicly rejected "merit" as category. The Reformed confessions, in contrast, have the highest regard for "merit" and regularly describe Christ's work as "meritorious" because they taught that the fulfilled a legal covenant of works thus making possible a covenant of grace for sinners.
The FV is anti-confessional. It is nothing less than a competing system of soteriology premised on a competing hermeneutic (the dubious and discredited old German notion of "Hellenism v. Hebraic" views of God and salvation).
Hence redemptive history. hehe
