Charge: Calvinism Makes God the Author of Sin

Arminian Complaint: Calvinism Makes God the Author of Sin

Calvinist, R.C. Sproul, clarifies: “The distortion of double predestination looks like this: There is a symmetry that exists between election and reprobation. God WORKS in the same way and same manner with respect to the elect and to the reprobate. That is to say, from all eternity God decreed some to election and by divine initiative works faith in their hearts and brings them actively to salvation. By the same token, from all eternity God decrees some to sin and damnation (destinare ad peccatum) and actively intervenes to work sin in their lives, bringing them to damnation by divine initiative. In the case of the elect, regeneration is the monergistic work of God. In the case of the reprobate, sin and degeneration are the monergistic work of God. Stated another way, we can establish a parallelism of foreordination and predestination by means of a positive symmetry. We can call this a positive-positive view of predestination. This is, God positively and actively intervenes in the lives of the elect to bring them to salvation. In the same way God positively and actively intervenes in the life of the reprobate to bring him to sin. This distortion of positive-positive predestination clearly makes God the author of sin

who punishes a person for doing what God monergistically and irresistibly coerces man to do. Such a view is indeed a monstrous assault on the integrity of God. This is not the Reformed view of predestination, but a gross and inexcusable caricature of the doctrine. Such a view may be identified with what is often loosely described as hyper-Calvinism and involves a radical form of supralapsarianism. Such a view of predestination has been virtually universally and monolithically rejected by Reformed thinkers.” (Double Predestination, emphasis mine)

According to Sproul, it is undeniable that God is made the author of sin IF, from all eternity, He has  decreed anyone to sin and damnation by efficaciously working sin in their lives. Such a thing, he calls a “monstrous assault on the integrity of God.” However, IS that not exactly what John Calvin taught, then denied, then affirmed and then declared that curious men are not to peer into the secrets of God, just as we are not to curiously peer into the Sun itself? As Calvin speaks, what you will find is that God is made the author of sin, but is not to be held guilty of sin because He allegedly brings it about through secondary causes, while He Himself is the proximate cause and Determiner. But first, Calvin will explain the Providence of God from the Deterministic perspective, and then he will address his opponents, and finally he will condemn the curious who seek to examine him too fully:

John Calvin writes: “We also note that we should consider the creation of the world so that we may realize that everything is subject to God and ruled by his will and that when the world has done what it may, nothing happens other than what God decrees.” (Acts: Calvin, The Crossway Classic Commentaries, p.66, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “First, the eternal predestination of God, by which before the fall of Adam He decreed what should take place concerning the whole human race and every individual, was fixed and determined.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.121, emphasis mine)

Calvin explains: “God had no doubt decreed before the foundation of the world what He would do with every one of us and had assigned to everyone by His secret counsel his part in life.” (Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries: Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians, p.20, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “…the reason why God elects some and rejects others is to be found in His purpose alone. … before men are born their lot is assigned to each of them by the secret will of God. … the salvation or the destruction of men depends on His free election.” (Calvin’s New Testament Commentaries: Romans and Thessalonians, p.203, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Everything is controlled by God’s secret purpose, and nothing can happen except by his knowledge and will.” (The Institutes of Christian Religion, p.72, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “What we must prove is that single events are ordered by God and that every event comes from his intended will. Nothing happens by chance.” (The Institutes of Christian Religion, p.73, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “When he uses the term permission, he means that the will of God is the supreme and primary cause of everything, because nothing happens without his order of permission.” (The Institutes of Christian Religion, p.75, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “He has plenty of reasons for comfort as he realises that the devil and all the ungodly are reined in by God, so that they cannot conceive, plan or carry out any crime, unless God allows it, indeed commands it. They are not only in bondage to him, but are forced to serve him. It is the Lord’s prerogative to enable the enemy’s rage and to control it at will, and it is in his power to decide how far and how long it may last, so that wicked men cannot break free and do exactly what they want....” (The Institutes of Christian Religion, pp.81-82, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “First, it must be observed that the will of God is the cause of all things that happen in the world; and yet God is not the author of evil.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.169, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Whatever things are done wrongly and unjustly by man, these very things are the right and just works of God. This may seem paradoxical at first sight to some....” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.169, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Further what I said before is to be remembered, that since God manifests His power through means and inferior causes, it is not to be separated from them.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.170, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “But where it is a matter of men’s counsels, wills, endeavours, and exertions, there is greater difficulty in seeing how the providence of God rules here too, so that nothing happens but by His assent and that men can deliberately do nothing unless He inspire it.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, pp.171-172, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Indeed, the ungodly pride themselves on being competent to effect their wishes. But the facts show in the end that by them, unconsciously and unwillingly, what was divinely ordained is implemented.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.173, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Does God work in the hearts of men, directing their plans and moving their wills this way and that, so that they do nothing but what He has ordained?” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.174, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “For the man who honestly and soberly reflects on these things, there can be no doubt that the will of God is the chief and principal cause of all things.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.177, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “But of all the things which happen, the first cause is to be understood to be His will, because He so governs the natures created by Him, as to determine all the counsels and the actions of men to the end decreed by Him.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.178, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “But it is quite frivolous refuge to say that God otiosely permits them, when Scripture shows Him not only willing but the author of them.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.176, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “But the objection is not yet resolved, that if all things are done by the will of God, and men contrive nothing except by His will and ordination, then God is the author of all evils.”  (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.179, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Thinking that the difficulty here may be resolved by a single word, some are foolish enough serenely to overlook what occasions the greatest ambiguity; namely, how God may be free of guilt in doing the very thing that He condemns in Satan and the reprobate and which is to be condemned by men.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.179, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “We learn that nothing happens but what seems good to God. How then is God to be exempted from the blame to which Satan with his instruments is liable?” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.180, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “What I have maintained about the diversity of causes must not be forgotten: the proximate cause is one thing, the remote cause another.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.181, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Certain shameless and illiberal people charge us with calumny by maintaining that God is made the author of sin, if His will is made first cause of all that happens. For what man wickedly perpetrates, incited by ambition or avarice or lust or some other depraved motive, since God does it by his hand with a righteous through perhaps hidden purpose--this cannot be equated with the term sin.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.181, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “Must we then impute the guilt of sin to God, or invent a double will for Him so that He falls out with Himself? I have shown that He wills the same as the criminal and the wicked, but in a different way. So now it is to be maintained that there is diversity of kinds while He wills in the same way, so that out of the variety which perplexes us a harmony may be beautifully contrived.”  (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.184, emphasis mine)

To test the validity of Calvin’s secondary causes defense, consider the analogy of a husband who hires a contract-killer to murder his wife. After the crime is committed, and both parties are arrested, do you suppose that in court, the husband will be declared “Not Guilty” by reason that he was merely the Conspirator? Will he be exhonerated on the grounds that someone else, namely a secondary cause, was the one who actually pulled the trigger? In reality, however, the Prosecutor will, most often, offer to Plea Bargain with the secondary agent in order to levy their greatest charge against the primary agent. Therefore, not only does the “secondary causes defense” fail to exonerate the Conspirator, it further backfires as the Conspirator is the one held in greatest contempt.

Dave Hunt asks: “Would God not be culpable, at least as a partner in crime, for causing man to sin? No, says the Calvinist, because we can’t apply our standards to God.” (Debating Calvinism, p.312)

That’s called Special Pleading.

Calvin writes: “It is any wonder that such immense splendour should blunt the acuteness of our mind? Our physical eyes are not enough to sustain a contemplation of the sun. Is our spiritual insight greater than our natural powers, or the majesty of God inferior to the glory of the sun? Is it becoming in us, then, not to be too inquisitive....” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, pp.184-185, emphasis mine)

Calvin writes: “These shallow people imply that the prayers of the faithful must be misguided and unnecessary, because they beg the Lord to act in things which he has decreed from eternity. Attributing whatever happens to the Providence of God, they excuse the person who has deliberately planned it. Has a murderer killed an innocent man? He has only, they say, carried out God’s will. Has someone committed theft or adultery? He is merely the one who carries out what the Lord has ordained. Has a son stood by, waiting for his parents to die, without trying to do anything? He must not oppose God, who had planned it all from eternity. In this way, all crimes are called virtues, because they must be according to God’s will.” (The Institutes of Christian Religion, p.77, emphasis mine)

According to Calvin’s Deterministic Calvinism, is all murder the secret will of God? Is all theft and adultery exactly what the Lord hath authored, ordained and inspired? Is the cruelty of a family member exactly what God planned from all eternity? Does Calvinism inescapably render all crimes as “virtues”?

Non-Calvinist, Jim Foster, explains: “The part of God’s sovereignty that Calvinists don’t understand is that in His sovereignty, He gave us free wills. We are the ones who have taken that free will and decided to commit sin. Otherwise, God is somehow linked to all the world’s atrocities from the beginning of time and is ultimately responsible for them. The idea that God would ordain evil is contrary to everything the Bible teaches about God. A Calvinist would be forced to conclude - if God is good and is responsible for all evil - then evil must be good.”

Non-Calvinist, Dave Hunt, also writes: “The entire history of mankind becomes a puppet show, with God the puppeteer. He looked down upon men and saw that ‘the wickedness of man was great…. Every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually…. The earth also was corrupt…and…filled with violence’ (Genesis 6:5, 11). This situation ‘grieved [God] at his heart.’ But, if as Calvinism says, God caused every evil thought, word, and deed, why was He grieved? And how could God be grieved if He could have caused those living in Noah’s day to be saints rather than sinners but instead chose to damn them? Yet God is love?” (Debating Calvinism, p.314)

Arminian, John Wesley, comments about the ultimate implication of Calvinism: “…one might say to our adversary, the devil, ‘Thou fool, why dost thou roar about any longer? Thy lying in wait for souls is as needless and useless as our preaching. Hearest thou not, that God hath taken thy work out of thy hands; and that he doeth it much more effectually? Thou, with all thy principalities and powers, canst only so assault that we may resist thee; but He can irresistibly destroy both body and soul in hell! Thou canst only entice; but his unchangeable decrees, to leave thousands of souls in death, compels them to continue in sin, till they drop into everlasting burnings. Thou temptest; He forceth us to be damned; for we cannot resist his will. Thou fool, why goest thou about any longer, seeking whom thou mayest devour? Hearest thou not that God is the devouring lion, the destroyer of souls, the murderer of men? Moloch caused only children to pass though the fire: and that fire was soon quenched; or, the corruptible body being consumed, its torment was at an end; but God, thou are told, by his eternal decree, fixed before they had done good or evil, causes, not only children of a span long, but the parents also, to pass through the fire of hell, the “fire which never shall be quenched; and the body which is cast thereinto, being now incorruptible and immortal, will be ever consuming and never consumed, but “the smoke of their torment,” because it is God’s good pleasure, “ascendeth up for ever and ever.”’” (Free Grace, Sermon 128, Preached at Bristol, in the year 1740)

Is this a fair charge against Calvinism? Has God taken the work of the devil out of His hands and done it more effectively by irreversible, blind eternal decrees?

The Calvinistic, Westminster Confession of Faith, states: “The almighty power, unsearchable wisdom, and infinite goodness of God so far manifest themselves in his providence, that it extendeth itself even to the first fall, and all other sins of angels and men; and that not by a bare permission, but such as hath joined with it a most wise and powerful bounding, and otherwise ordering, and governing of them, in a manifold dispensation, to his own holy ends; yet so, as the sinfulness thereof proceedeth only from the creature, and not from God, who, being most holy and righteous, neither is nor can be the author or approver of sin.” (The Westminster Confession of Faith, IV. Of Providence, emphasis mine)

This is a fancy way of saying that God decreed sin, but did not the author of sin. Perhaps what is meant is that God is the author of sin, but is not guilty of sin, since it is carried out by secondary causes. However, the Bible reveals that God is not the author of any of it, when it states: “For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.” (1st Corinthians 14:33, KJV) In that passage, the reason why God is “not the author of confusion” is because God didn’t design for there to be chaos in His church by the misuse of the gift of tongues. Therefore, it stands to reason, that if God is not the author of confusion, He could not, therefore, have planned confusion. Similarly, then, if God is not the author of sin, He could not have planned sin. While it’s one thing for God to allow and then use the evil intentions of man to accomplish good, it’s quite another thing to plot evil as its source.

Calvinists allege that it pleased God to decree sin, based upon such verses as Genesis 50:20 and Psalm 115:3. However, if God decreed abomination, consider Jeremiah 32:35, which states: “They built the high places of Baal that are in the valley of Ben-hinnom to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire to Molech, which I had not commanded them nor had it entered My mind that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.” For if it didn’t even enter God’s mind that Israel should commit this abomination, how then, can the Calvinists simultaneously say that it entered God’s mind to sovereignly decree that they must do it? Must they invent a contradictory Double Will?

Calvinist, Erwin Lutzer explains: “The devil is also a being filled with only hatred and deceit. He is a rebellious liar and malicious sadist. He desires to see humans suffer for suferring’s sake. Thus he always stands in opposition to God even when he does what God ordains.” (The Doctrines That Divide, p.221, emphasis mine)

If God was merely turning the unrepentant wicked over into the hands of the devil for judgment, then I would agree that there could still be a logical basis for the devil still remaining in opposition to God despite carrying out God’s orders. However, if you add that God is the one who decreed that the individual should be formed from the womb as unrepentant and wicked, in having allegedly, decided that person’s lot in life by a decreed Script of Life, which includes a world full of wickedness, then there would be no remaining logical basis to separate the decree-er from what is decreed. Blind decrees, with no real foreknowledge, unavoidably would render God as the author of sin. Calvinists can deny the charge all they wish, but simply denying something doesn’t make it untrue. The only logical answer, that I’ve seen from Calvinists, is that if God is not concerned about being the author of sin, then why should they? At least that Calvinist, isn’t throwing up one smoke screen after another, and is honestly addressing the unavoidable ramifications of Calvinism.

John Calvin writes: “If those who attribute the hardening of men to His eternal counsel invest God with the character of a tyrant, we are certainly not the author of this opinion.” (Concerning the Eternal Predestination of God, p.60, emphasis mine)

In other words, if anyone thinks that blindly predestining sin, makes the Predestinator a “tyrant,” then he doesn’t agree. But why not? Are not men who plot wickedness, themselves wicked? Therefore, if God allegedly wrote the Script of Life with a world full of wickedness, what’s the difference?

The evil intentions of man do not originate with God, but within man’s own sinful nature. By God’s Middle Knowledge, He weighs a man’s heart (Proverbs 21:2), and with His infinite understanding (Psalm 147:5), He formulates His own plan. If God does not ponder a man’s heart before enacting His own plans, then why is it that the Bible teaches at Acts 2:23, that God’s predetermined plan is accompanied by His Foreknowledge?

Next let’s another plank of Calvinism, regarding the foreordination of sin:

The Westminster Confession of Faith states: “God from all eternity did by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass; yet so as thereby neither is God the author of sin; nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures, nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.” (Of God’s Eternal Decree, emphasis mine)

That’s twice now, that we have seen the Westminster Confession of faith, deny that God is the “author or approver of sin,” while yet in relation to sin, we see the words “ordering” and “ordain.”

R.C. Sproul explains: “If He decides to allow something, then in a sense he is foreordaining it.”  (Chosen By God, p.26, emphasis mine)

That’s not true. One is a negative action and the other is a positive action.

Calvinist, Erwin Lutzer, similarly argues: “Both Calvinists and Arminians teach that God does not and cannot do evil. Calvinists say that God nonetheless ordains it through secondary causes. Arminians say God only permits it. Nonetheless, his permission necessarily means that he bore ultimate responsibility for it. After all, he could have chosen ‘not to permit it.’” (The Doctrines that Divide, pp.209-210, emphasis mine)

Does that mean that the father of the Prodigal Son, necessarily bore ultimate responsibility for his wayward son’s sinful lifestyle, simply because he permitted him to leave with his share of the inheritance? Who would argue such a point?

Furthermore, if there is room in foreordaining for permission, then why didn’t the Westminster state: God from all eternity did...allow whatsoever comes to pass? Yet, we have also seen from the Westminster the alleged, immutable decree [script] it is “not by a bare permission.” Adopting Calvin’s defense, the Westminster employs the now exposed, “second causes” defense.

R.C. Sproul explains: “If there is one single molecule in this universe running around loose, totally free of God’s sovereignty, then we have no guarantee that a single promise of God will ever be fulfilled. Perhaps that on maverick molecule will lay waste all the grand and glorious plans that God has made and promised to us.” (Chosen By God, pp.26-27, emphasis mine)

What if that “one molecule” was sin? What if someone committed an abomination that God never decreed anyone to commit? (Jeremiah 32:35) What if someone committed an act that was beyond what He intended? (Zechariah 1:15) Will these molecules of sin, outside the will of God, shake loose God’s throne in heaven, and give Satan a chance to catch God off guard? Listen, God is eternal, which means that He dwells independent of time. You don’t have to worry about His sovereignty. He is omniscient and omnipresent. Nothing remains unknown to Him, nor is anything able to find a place to hide from Him. By God’s omniscient, Middle Knowledge, He not only knows what you will do, but also what you could and would do, in any situation. However, Calvinist philosophers, modern and historical, who’ve wished to protect God’s sovereignty, have extended to Him the odious origin of sin, though vehemently denying the guilt of sin, by means of secondary causes:

R.C. Sproul explains: “If is true that in some sense God foreordains everything that comes to pass, then it follows with no doubt that God must have foreordained the entrance of sin into the world. That is not to say that God forced it to happen or that he imposed evil upon his creation. All that means is that God must have decided to allow it to happen.” (Chosen By God, p.31, emphasis mine)

R.C. Sproul explains: “In spite of this excruciating problem we still must affirm that God is not the author of sin.” (Chosen By God, p.31, emphasis mine)

Why? Why must you fight this argument to your last breath, as if it was the Boogeyman of Calvinism? Suppose that God was, in fact, the author of sin? Why would you need to fight it? If God was not concerned about it, then why should you be? Really, in the end, the only thing that matters is what the Bible says. So for Calvinists to belligerently draw their lines in the sand, concerning the “author of sin” charge, only sets themselves up to be considered, irrational. It seems that you could say almost the same exact thing, but with different wording, and that would pacify the Calvinists, and indeed, that’s exactly what Sproul has done when he claims that God foreordained the entrance of sin, but did not author sin. I’d like to know where the difference lies. In other words, God is the entrance of sin into the world, but by no means whatsoever, by any stretch of the imagination, is He the author of sin into the world. That, we just can’t have, says the Calvinist, end of discussion. Since Calvinists have tinkered with the definition of ordain, why don’t they simply tinker with the definition of author? In other words, God may have authored the Script of Life which contains sin, but He, by no means, endorses their behavior, no more than J.R.R Tolkien endorses the behavior of Sauron. However, real life is not like a book, in which there is a Script of Life by which men play parts in a Divine play at the direction of God. That is more philosophy than theology. This is not to say that God does not have books, plans and decrees. Of course He does, but do not forget that real foreknowledge is the basis for God’s decrees. (Acts 2:23)

Here is a link to a Blog discussion, or consider these verses: John 8:44, 1st John 3:8, Revelation 17:17.

The Providence of God from the Deterministic Perspective:

The Providence of God from Secret Purpose Perspective:

Calvin denies that God is the Author of Evil:

Calvin address the Paradoxical nature of his theory:

Calvin address what he terms “the scoffers”:

Calvin establishes Secondary Causes with Man:

Calvin establishes Primary Causes with God:

Calvin conceds that which God permits, He authors:

Calvin faces the dilemma:

Calvin gives his answer:

Calvin warns against curiosity into the Hidden Will:

Question:  What is the Arminian explanation of the origin of sin?

Adrian Rogers answers:  “Did you know that there are many people who are not believing, and their problem is not a scientific problem. They’re not wrestling with ideas like evolution or creation. Their problem is a problem of history. They say, ‘If there is a God, and that God is a good God, then look at all of the suffering. Why, if God is good, why do we have sin? Why do we have suffering?’ And they have a little argument, a little syllogism, and here’s the way the syllogism goes: If there be a God, He would be the author of everything. Evil is something, so God is the author of evil. What kind of a God is it that has created evil? And so they say, ‘I can’t believe in a God who made everything and made it like He did, and so therefore He must not be a good God, if He is a God at all.’ But that’s not straight thinking. Let me tell you the way it truly is. God is the author of everything. God made everything perfect, and when God made man, God made His creature perfectly free. Free Will, then, man’s perfect free will, is the origin of evil. God created perfection, and God made man perfectly free, and freedom, therefore, gave rise to this evil. You see, this is what makes us moral creatures. Somebody says, ‘Why didn’t God just make us where we couldn’t sin?’ Well, if God had made us where we couldn’t sin, He could have no more fellowship with me that I could have with that pulpit or that speaker. ... Love is highest good, and God wants us to love Him. This is the first and great commandment: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, with all thy mind.’ Love is the highest good, but forced love is a contradiction in terms. Forced love is not love at all. In order to love, we must be free to love, to choose to love, and in order to choose to love, we have to be able to choose not to love. And so God gave us perfect choice. Adam chose in the Garden of Eden, and the sons of Adam after him, to sin, and that’s where the heart-break, and the pain, and the groan, and the moan c