Grace and Free Will: The Pelagian Controversy Explored

now the this controversy uh broke out towards the end of the fourth century and carried over into the fifth century and finally was settled at the council of carthage in 418 in which council pelagius was condemned by the church as a heretic now as often is the case in the history of heretics and church decisions and decrees of that matter just because the church declares a theological position heretical and renounces it does not mean it just simply goes away and disappears once and for all [00:01:15]

pelagius was certainly british he was from the british isles and he was an earnest and zealous monk who traveled to rome and lived in rome and was very much exercised by the cavalier spirit that he found among the clergy and among christians in the eternal city and and in fact he was appalled by the licentiousness the godlessness and the conduct of those who were claiming to be christians and he was a zealot for the achieving of righteousness [00:02:38]

now when we use the term pharisee we usually use it in a pejorative sense we have a negative connotation of the pharisees because it was the pharisees who were always so hostile towards jesus that wasn't the first generation of pharisees the original pharisees were the puritans of their day men who loved the covenant of god men who loved the law of god and who were very much concerned about the moral laxity that had invaded the community of israel [00:03:31]

augustine had in his prayer made this statement o god grant what thou commandest and command what thou dost desire let me say it again o god grant what thou command us and command what thou dost desire how do you respond to such a prayer most of us would respond warmly and positively to such a prayer as that but not pelagius pelagius about had apoplexy when he read that prayer [00:05:08]

augustine of course was saying god give me a gift help me what god what augustine was talking about here was grace when he says god grant what thou dost command he was saying god give me the grace to be able to do what you command because augustine believed as we will see when we study him that man is unable to obey the commandments of god unless god grants the necessary grace to do it [00:07:05]

and being just god would never and indeed could never command his creature to do something that the creature is unable to do for god to command us to do something we are not able to do would be to impose an unjust commandment upon us and even worse to punish us when we failed to do what we couldn't possibly do in the first place would be diabolical [00:08:18]

man cannot obey the law of god without the help of grace because man is fallen and the effects of the fall involve to some degree or extent the loss of our moral power now god's law doesn't change in creation god said be holy even as i am holy you shall be perfect even as i am perfect but most of us would recognize today that the ability to be perfectly holy perfectly mirroring the righteousness of god is an ability we don't have [00:09:39]

so what was assumed by augustine here was the reality of the fall in light of the fall augustine was arguing we need grace in order to obey god so now the dispute turned into a controversy over the fall and its effects of course pelagius did not deny that adam sinned what he said is that adam was created good and in his creation he was made immutably good with respect to his constituent nature [00:10:57]

historically we would say that we are sinners not because we sin but we sin because we are sinners that is that we are born with a sin nature that's the point that was so sharply in dispute with pelagius so for pelagius man always has the ability to do either good or evil he has not lost the moral ability or the moral power to obey god [00:12:52]

he understood that the bible has much to say about grace and that grace is a good thing not a bad thing and there's nothing wrong with praying for grace but for pelagius grace the operative word is facilitates obedience or righteousness that is to say with the help of grace it is easier to live a life of moral perfection to be totally obedient to the law of god but it's not necessary [00:15:05]

what is at stake here with the pelagian attack is not just the idea of the necessity of grace but the whole concept of our salvation the whole understanding of what is going on in the drama of salvation since god's grace is now just a concluding unscientific postscript that is not something that is absolutely essential in order for us to be saved and it paves the way for the resurgence of neo-nomianism or pure legalism [00:18:20]

augustine saw this as an attack not simply on a minor point or a simple detail of christian theology but something that touches the very heart of our whole concept of salvation and redemption because before we can be saved we first have to understand our absolute need for salvation and our impoverished condition to understand that we are debtors who cannot pay our debts [00:21:15]