legal relations ; disregards the true nature of the mystical union ; and represents Christ and his righteousness as purely objective, instead of looking upon Christ as giving Himself, his life to become the life of the believer, and with his life conveying its merits and its power. We are not concerned at present with the theory on which this objection is founded, but simply with the objection itself. What is urged as an objection to the doctrine is true. It does concern what is outward and objective ; what is done for the sinner rather than what is done within him. But then it is to be considered, first, that this is what the sinner needs. He re- quires not only that his nature should be renewed and that a new principle of spiritual or divine life should be communicated to him ; but also that his guilt should be removed, his sins expiated, and justice satisfied, as the preliminary condition of his enjoying this new life, and being restored to the favour of God. And sec- ondly, that such is the constant representation of Scripture, our only trustworthy guide in matters of religious doctrine. The Bible makes quite as prominent what Christ does for us, as what He does in us. It says as much of his objective, expiatory work, as of the communication of a higher spiritual life to believers. It is only by ignoring this objective work of Christ, or by merging justification into inward renovation, that this objection has force or even plausibility. Protestants do not depreciate the value and necessity of the new life derived from Christ, because, in obedience to the Scriptures, they insist so strenuously upon the satisfaction which He has rendered by his perfect righteousness to the justice of God. Without the latter, the former is impossible.
§ 10. Departures from the Protestant Doctrine. Osiander. During the lifetime of the Reformers, a very earnest contro- versy began in the Lutheran Church on the nature of justification. This arose from the views of Andreas Osiander, a man of distin- guished learning and of a speculative turn of mind ; eminent first as a preacher, and afterwards as a professor in the university of Konigsberg. His principal work is entitled " De Unico Media- tore Jesu Christo et Justificatione Fidei. Confessio Andreas Osiandri." His difference of opinion from the other Reformers is clearly indicated in the following words, in which he denounces the errors which he means to oppose : " Omnes horribiliter errant. Primo, quia verbum justificare tantum pro justum reputare et pronunciare intelligunt, atque interpretantur, et non pro eo, quod
180 PART HI. Ch. xvil — justification.
est, reipsa et in veritate justum efficere. Deinde etiam in hoc, quod nullam differentiam tenent inter redemptionem et justifica- tionem, quum tamen magna differentia sit, sicut vel inde intelligi sit, quod homines furem a suspendio redimere possunt, bonum et justum emcere non possunt. Porro etiam in hoc, quod nihil certe statuere possunt, quid tandem justitia Christi sit, quam per fidem in nobis esse, nobisque imputari oporteat. Ac postremo errant omnium rudissime etiam in hoc, quod divinam naturam Christi a justificatione separant, et Christum dividunt atque solvunt, id quod haud dubie exeerandi Satanae opus est." 1
Osiander taught, (1.) That Christ has redeemed us by the satisfaction which He rendered to divine justice. (2.) But he denied that this was any part of our justification. (3.) He maintained that to justify does not mean to declare just, or to render righteous in a judicial or forensic sense, but to render in- herently or subjectively just and holy. (4.) That the righteous- ness of Christ by which the believer is justified, and which he receives by faith, and which is imputed to him in the judgment of God, is not, as the Protestants taught, the work of Christ, con- sisting in what He did and suffered as the substitute of sinners, nor is it, as Romanists teach, the work of the Holy Spirit consist- ing in the infusion of a holy nature or of new habits of grace, but it is the "essential righteousness of God," "the divine essence," " God Himself." (5.) That consequently the proximate and real ground of our acceptance with God, and of our reception into heaven, is what we are, or what we become, in virtue of this in- dwelling of God in the soul.
The speculations of Osiander as to the nature of God and his relation to man, might have led him under any circumstances to adopt the peculiar views above stated, but the proximate cause was no doubt the reaction from the too exclusive prominence given at that time to the objective work of Christ. This is not to be wondered at, and perhaps was not to be blamed. The Ro- manists, with whom the Protestants had to contend, did not deny the necessity of an inward change in the nature of fallen man. But they made this almost all of Christ's redeeming work. What He did for the expiation of sin and for meeting the de- mands of justice, was only to open the way for God's giving re- newing and sanctifying grace to sinners. Men were themselves to merit eternal life. It was unavoidable therefore, that the Re- formers should strenuously insist upon what Christ did for us,
1 Confess™, Konigsberg, 1551 ; by count, pp. 42, 43, of the text.