THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
tradictory if by the Spirit that effects faith is understood the Spirit of God incorporate in the Word and the congregation, and by the Spirit that is imparted to faith the individualized spirit dwelling in the believer. But as this distinction was generally unobserved, there resulted a different interpretation of regeneration in the process of salvation. If Luther's conception of regeneration as the " gift of faith " was to be adhered to, it must neccessarily be considered as the presupposition of the life of faith in general and consequently as preceding justification. But if one holds the idea that only the individual possession of the spirit effects regeneration, then regeneration is the consequence of the sonship attained in faith. In the latter instance regeneration is reduced to a secondary position but receives a richer ethical import. Still more important for the later development of the doctrine was the question in regard to the relation of regeneration to baptism. Some dogmaticians adhered to the bold thesis of Luther that the baptism of infants and the regeneration of adults by faith in the Word were essentially the same process. But the later theologians taught in connection with the doctrine of baptism a regeneration which was not at the same time a renovation of life, but communicated to the soul chained by hereditary sin the capacity to believe. In this way the conception of regeneration was considerably emptied and placed where it could no longer serve as an expression of the experience of salvation.
Pietism opposed this shallow conception of regeneration, representing it as an experience of faith, and was intent upon insuring its de- 5. Pietism, velopment into a new moral attitude. Spener (q.v.) taught that in the moment of regeneration, which coincides with that of justification, there is posited in the believer a new principle of life that develops into sanctification. The Lutheran doctrine of justification was the basis of the certainty of salvation also for Zinzendorf (q.v.), but in one period of his life he held a mysticotheosophic theory of regeneration, representing it not so much as an experience of faith as a mysterious penetration of the power of the blood of Christ. Similar thoughts of a substantial or physiological interpretation of regeneration are found in P. Nicolai (q.v.) at the beginning of the seventeenth century, in the Swabian Pietism, in J. A. Bengel, F. C. Oetinger, and Michael Hahn (qq.v.). Also in modern Pietism frequently Methodistic thoughts appear of a second experience of grace after justification that is to lead man to the threshold of sinless perfection. In this the fact is overlooked that justifying faith conceived in its Biblical and Reformation depth includes already this second act of self-surrender.
The treatment of the conception of regeneration in modern theology presents a variegated if not confused picture. A stimulating influence upon the development of dogma was Immanuel Kant's postulate of radical evil and the deepening of the idea of personality by the distinction of the " intelligible " and the empiric character. What R. Eucken, following J. G. Fichte, indicates as "Wesensbildung " is essentially a philosophical parallel
to Christian regeneration. The fruit of philosophical idealism was made especially productive for
theology by Schleiermacher, who taught
6. In that regeneration on the subjective
Modern side as the reception of the individ-
Theology. ual into the life communion of Christ
corresponds to redemption as the communication of sinless perfection and blessedness. It is the foundation of a new character, while sanctification is its unfolding. The change that has begun with regeneration may be regarded either as a changed form of life, conversion, the elements of which are repentance and faith; or as a changed relation to God or a changed feeling of life, justification. Most of the theologians who followed Schleiermacher returned to that sense of justification according to which it is grounded upon a divine judgment, without, however, relinquishing the thought that this judgment accrues to the believer only in so far as he is in real union with Christ. Thus in avoiding an empty concept of faith, they returned to the original Reformation idea. Four other types parallel to the above may be distinguished: (1) The adherence to the combination of regeneration and baptism, involving the belabored efforts of integrating the turning to God or conversion later in life with infant baptism;
(2) the theosophical representation of regeneration is that of a transubstantiation. Richard Rothe (q.v.), with his followers, approaches from his conception of the spirit as the unity of the ideal and the natural existence. From regeneration there follows the positing of a spiritual nature which is to unfold in organic growth toward imperishable results.
(3) Another group of theologians, among them especially Albrecht Ritschl (q.v.), replaces the conception of regeneration by that of justification in order to prevent every Pietistic obscuration of the doctrine of grace. Regeneration, if the term is preferred, is not to be distinguished from justification or adoption. Ethical transformation is hereby secured in that, in reconciliation, the purpose of the kingdom of God is appropriated and by doing good, freedom from the world, or eternal life, is attained. Johann Georg Wilhelm Herrmann (q.v.) insists that regeneration can not be established externally as a fact, but only by a judgment of faith. This judgment bases itself not upon our possession, but upon the attitude which God in Christ assumes toward us. According to Julius Wilhelm Martin Kaftan (q.v.) the divine act of redemption fulfilled in Christ, especially in his death and resurrection, becomes by faith a personal experience involving ethical renewal. In the conception of regeneration these three elements are by faith perceived as a totality.
(4) Richard Adelbert Lipsius (q.v.) designates regeneration as the ethical side of the state of grace in distinction from justification as its religious side. Regeneration accordingly is called the logical consequence of justification.
Regeneration is here represented as the divinely wrought origin of a new, personal existence. But the term can denote only its origin; the preservation and growth of the new life are not included in the conception, but are to be represented as the state of the children of God. Moreover, there is