582 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 To 1530.
even Christ himself, with all his apostles and prophets, who have founded this article, ‘I believe a holy Christian church,’ as solemnly affirmed by Christ when he promised, ‘ Behold, I am with you all the days, even to the end of the world’ (Matt. 28: 20), and by St. Paul when he says, ‘ The church of God is the pillar and ground of the truth’ (1 Tim. 3:15).”!
A Roman controversialist could not lay more stress on tradition than Luther does in this passage. But tradition, — at least from the sixth to the sixteenth century, strongly favors the belief in transubstantiation, and the sacrifice of the mass, both of which he rejected. And if the same test should be applied to his doctrine of solifidian justification, it would be difficult to support it by patristic or scholastic tradition, which makes no distinction between justification and sanctification, and lays as much stress on good works as on faith. He felt it himself, that on this vital point, not even Augustin was on his side. His doctrine can be vindicated only as a new interpretation of St. Paul in advance of the previous understanding.
Calvin, if we may here anticipate his views as expounded in the first chapters of the fourth book of his “Institutes of the Christian Religion,” likewise clearly distinguishes between the visible and invisible church,? and in the visible church again between the true evangelical church and the false papal church, which he assails as unmercifully as Luther; yet he also. admits that the Roman communion, notwithstanding the antichristian character of the papacy, yea, for the very reason that Antichrist sits “in the temple of God,” remains a church with the Scriptures and valid Christian ordinances.2 So the Jewish synagogue under
1 De Wette, Briefe, TV. 354,
2 Lib. IV., c. i., §§ 4 and 7. He speaks most eloquently of the ecclesia visibilis, as our mother in whose womb we are conceived to enter into spiritual life.
8 Lib. IV., c. ii., § 12: ** Antichristum in templo Dei sessurum preedixerunt Daniel et Paulus (Dan. 9: 27; 2 Thess. 2:4): illius scelerati et abominandi
§ 85. ENLARGED CONCEPTION OF THE CHURCH. 533
Caiaphas retained the law and the prophets, the rites and ceremonies, of the theocracy.
The Westminster Confession implies the same theory, and supports it by the same questionable exegesis of 2 Thess. 2: 3 sqq. and Rev. 18: 1-8.
The claims of the Roman Church rest on a broader and more solid base than the papacy, which is merely the form of her government. The papal hierarchy was often as corrupt as the Jewish hierarchy, and some popes were as wicked as Caiaphas ;? but this fact cannot destroy the claims nor invalidate the ordinances of the Roman Church, which from the days of the apostles down to the Reformation has been identified with the fortunes of Western Christendom, and which remains to this day the largest visible church in the world. To deny her church character is to stultify history, and to nullify the promise of Christ. (Matt. 16:18; 28: 20.)
regni ducem et antesignanum, apud nos facimus Romanum Pontificem. Quod sedes ejus in templo Dei collocatur, ita innuitur, tale fore ejus regnum quod nec Christi nec ecclesie nomen aboleat. Hinc igitur patet nos minime negare, quin sub ejus quoque tyrannide ecclesiw maneant: sed quas sacrilega impietate profanarit, guas immani dominatione afflixerit, quas malis et exitialibus doctrinis, ceu venenatis potionibus, corruperit, et propemodum enecarit, in quibus semisepultus lateat Christus, obrutum Evangelium, pro- Jligata pietas, cultus Dei fere abolitus: in quibus denique omnia sic sint conturbata, ut Babylonis potius quam civitatis Dei sancte facies illic appareat.’”’ Comp. IV., 7, § 25; and Calvin’s commentary on 2 Thess. 2: 3.
1Ch. XXV. 6: “* The Pope of Rome... is that Antichrist, that man of sin and perdition, that exalteth himself in the Church against Christ and all that is called God.”? And yet there are American divines who derive from this passage the very opposite conclusion; namely, that the Roman Church is no chureh at all, and that all her ordinances are invalid. An attempt to sanction this conclusion was made at the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church at Cincinnati in 1885, but failed. The Westminster Confession never calls the Roman Church Antichrist, but only the Pope, who is no more the Roman Church than the Moderator of the General Assembly is the General Assembly, or the President of the United States is the American people, or the Czar of Russia is Russia. The government is only one factor in the life of a nation or a church.
2 Dante locates them in the Inferno; and Mohler says, ‘‘ Hell has swallowed them up.’’