Justification And Union With Christ, Part 11

A. A. Hodge on the Ordo Salutis, Part 1

The following is a detailed summary of the incredibly important essay by A. A. Hodge, ���The Ordo Salutis: or, Relation in the Order of Nature of Holy Character and Divine Favor,��� published in The Princeton Review 54 (1878): 304-21. A condensed version of the same material may be found in his Outlines of Theology [1879 enlarged edition], pp. 517-518.

Archibald Alexander Hodge (1823���1886) was the son of the great Charles Hodge. From 1864 to 1877, he held the chair of systematic theology at Western Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh. In 1877, he was called from Western to serve at Princeton Theological Seminary as an associate professor of systematic theology. The following year, the elder Hodge died, and the younger Hodge took up his father���s distinguished chair of systematic theology at Princeton. Note that the date of this essay (1878) coincides with these significant events in his personal life and career as a professor.

The Question

The question that A. A. Hodge proposes to deal with in this essay pertains to the ordo salutis, the logical ordering of the principal acts of God in the application of redemption. More specifically, he poses this question:

In the application of redemption to the individual sinner, which, in the order of nature, precedes and conditions the other���justification or regeneration? (p. 304)

These two terms���justification and regeneration���cover the two main benefits of salvation, the forensic and the transformative. And, as Hodge points, it is a distinctive mark of Protestant soteriology to make a clear distinction between these two benefits, in contrast with Roman Catholic soteriology which conflates them.

With the Protestants, justification is a forensic act of God, declaring that the law as a covenant of life is satisfied, and that the subject is no longer subject to its penalty, but entitled henceforth to the rewards conditioned upon obedience. Regeneration, on the other hand, is a subjective change in the moral character of the subject, the gracious commencement of his complete restoration to the moral image of God, effected by the Holy Spirit in progressive sanctification. (p. 311)

The question that Hodge wants to answer in this essay is: What is the relationship between the forensic and the transformative, between justification and regeneration? Is there a causal ordering of them in the ordo salutis? Of course, Hodge clarifies that the ���question is obviously one as to order, not of time, but of cause and effect��� (p. 313). The technical term used by Protestant scholastics to refer to this kind of order (logical or causal order) was ���the order of nature.��� In other words, to refer back to the title of the essay, Hodge is seeking to investigate the ���relation in the order of nature of holy character [transformative] and divine favor [forensic].���

Hodge���s Answer

Hodge���s answer is that the forensic has logical or causal priority to the transformative. He quotes from Dr. Dorner���s History of Protestant Theology in support:

It is evident that God must himself already have been secretly favorable and gracious to a man, and must already have pardoned him in foro divino [in the divine court], for the sake of Christ and his relation to human nature, in order to be able to bestow upon him the grace of regeneration. The vocation of the individual to salvation could not result unless God had already, in preventing love, previously pardoned the sinner for Christ���s sake. In fact, viewed as an actus Dei forensis, there is a necessity that it should be regarded as existing prior to man���s consciousness thereof���nay, prior to faith. (p. 316)

Hodge does not say this, but I would like to point out the eminently biblical character of Dorner���s beautiful statement here. Paul always places the love of God back of the effectual calling by which we are brought into the conscious enjoyment of the blessings of salvation (adoption as sons, the indwelling of the Spirit, the forgiveness of sins, etc.):

���In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ ��� in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses��� (Eph 1:4-7). ���God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us ��� made us alive together with Christ��� (Eph 2:4-5). ���God���s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us��� (Rom 5:5). ���God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood,��� etc. (Rom 5:8-10).

God loved us before we even knew it. The forensic has causal priority over the transformative. God���s forensic imputation of Christ���s righteousness to us, his setting his love on us for Christ���s sake, is the cause of faith, not vice versa.

The Problem

But there is a problem. The problem is that Paul clearly teaches that we are justified by faith. ���So we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ��� (Gal 2:15; cp. 3:24; Rom 3:28; 5:1). If we Protestants know anything, we know that we are justified by faith. But the problem is that faith is itself a gift of God. Reformed soteriology makes clear that faith is the result of sovereign monergistic regeneration. Regeneration is the cause of faith. Through effectual calling, we hear the word of the gospel and by the working of the Spirit in regeneration our hearts are changed so that we can now exercise faith. Putting that doctrine together with the previous one, since regeneration is the cause of the faith by which we are justified, it is evident that regeneration or effectual calling must go before justification. That seems to contradict Hodge���s thesis that justification in the order of nature has causal priority over regeneration.

The Solution

To deal with this problem, Hodge appeals to Federal Theology. Federal Theology refers to the overarching two-Adams structure of God���s dealings with mankind per Paul���s teaching in Romans 5:12-21. Just as the Creator made a covenant of works with the first Adam, conditioning his attainment of eschatological advancement on his obedience, so the Father made a covenant of works with Christ as the second Adam (aka the pactum salutis). Christ���s work as the second Adam merits not only the benefits of redemption but even the details of the way in which those benefits are applied in time to each of the elect.  

The solution of this problem is to be found in the fact ��� that Christ by his obedience and suffering impetrated* for his own people, not only the possibility of salvation, but salvation itself and all it includes, and the certainty and means of its application also. This he did in the execution of the provisions of a covenant engagement with his Father, which provides for the application of the purchased redemption to specific persons at certain times, and under certain conditions, all which conditions are impetrated* by Christ, as well as definitely determined by the covenant. (pp. 316-317) [*Impetrate: ���to obtain by request or exertion,��� Oxford English Dictionary]

Relying on the distinction between redemption accomplished and redemption applied, Hodge argues that both redemption accomplished and redemption applied are definite and have the elect in view. The application of redemption is founded on, purchased by, or ���impetrated��� by Christ in the accomplishment of redemption. The gift of faith in regeneration was purchased or merited by Christ for the elect according to the terms of the pactum salutis. Therefore, even though justification is by faith and faith is a gift of God effected by regeneration, regeneration itself was merited by Christ and therefore the forensic is ultimately the causal ground of the transformative. ���The satisfaction and merit of Christ are the antecedent cause of regeneration��� (p. 313).