The Law-Gospel Distinction and Preaching
Herman
Bavinck Translated
by Nelson D. Kloosterman Herman
Bavinck was born in 1854, and raised in the experimental Calvinism of the
Dutch Second Reformation (the Nadere Reformatie). He studied theology at the
University of Leiden, and began teaching theology at the Theological School
of the Christian Reformed Churches (Christelijke Gereformeerde Kerken) at
Kampen in 1882. In 1902 Bavinck joined the faculty of the Free University of
Amsterdam as Professor of Systematic Theology, where he served until his
death in 1921. The
following material is a translation of paragraphs 520-521 of Herman Bavinck's
Gereformeerde Dogmatiek,
3rd unaltered edition, vol. 4 (Kampen, J. H. Kok, 1918), pages 489-498.
Punctuation, sentence length, and paragraph divisions reflect editorial
decisions made for ease of reading. Bavinck's footnotes are included in the
text between brackets in the form of paraphrased summary. These
two sections form part of Chapter X, "Concerning the Means of
Grace." Bavinck opens the chapter with §56, "The Word as Means of
Grace." He has some beautiful things to say about the power of the Word
in regeneration and about the church as the "nursery" of that
working. Within this subsection we find his discussion of the Word of God as
law and as gospel. 520. The first and
primary means of grace is the Word of God. Lutheran and Reformed agree with
each other here. Nevertheless, the latter do not discuss the Word of God
under the heading of the means of grace, since in their dogmatics they have
usually treated it by this time in a separate chapter [reference to Calvin, Institutes 2.7-9, and others], or
also concerning the law in connection with the covenant of works, and
concerning the Gospel in connection with the covenant of grace [reference to
Marck, Med. Theol. and
'many others']. This
peculiar method of treatment does not warrant the claim that the Reformed did
not acknowledge the Word of God as means of grace, for they repeatedly
declare the very opposite [reference to BC 24, HC qu. 65). But one may indeed
conclude from this fact that for the Reformed, the Word of God possessed a
far richer meaning than that it served as means of grace only in the narrower
sense of the word. The Word of God is to be distinguished from the sacrament
in part by the fact that the latter serves to strengthen faith and thus has a
role only within the church. But the Word of God, both as law and as Gospel,
is revelation of the will of God, is the promulgation of the covenant of
works and the covenant of grace, addresses all people and every creature, and
has a universal meaning. The sacrament can be administered only by a lawfully
called minister in the gathering of believers, but the Word of God has an
existence and a place beyond that gathering, and performs there too its
manifold functions. As means of grace in the proper sense alongside the
sacrament, the Word of God is discussed insofar as it is preached openly by
the teacher; all the emphasis falls on the Word preached in God's name and by virtue of His commission.
But as a rule, people will likely have been in contact with that Word in the
home, at school, by means of conversation and reading material, long before
they hear it openly proclaimed in the church. So the public administration of
the Word hardly contains all the power proceeding from the Word; it serves
also to bring about faith in those who do not yet have it, but still more to
strengthen faith among believers in their gathering. In a Christian society
the Word of God reaches people in various ways, from various quarters, and it
reaches a person from the time of infancy. Yes, God brings that Word often to
the hearts of children in the internal calling already before consciousness
is awakened, in order to regenerate and to sanctify them, even as God writes
the work of the law in the heart of each person from the very beginning of
his existence. Therefore we must distinguish between the Word of God and
Scripture. Not in the sense that the Word of God is merely to be found in
Scripture and Scripture itself is not the Word of God; but in this other
sense, that the Word of God most frequently, even in most instances, does not
reach us as Scripture, in the form of the Scripture, but in such a way that
it is taken up from the Scripture into the consciousness of the church, from
there in turn radiating outward to the various people, to accomplish its
working, in the form of admonition and address, nurture and instruction, book
and writing, tract and summons. And God always stands behind that Word; He is
the one who makes it move in those various forms to people and thus calls
them to conversion and life. In Scripture, then, the expression "word of
God" is never identical to Scripture, even though Scripture may without
a doubt be called God's Word. A few passages come to mind where the
expression "word of God" is applied to a part of Holy Scripture,
for example, to the written law. But for the rest, the phrase "word of
God" when used in Scripture is never the same as the Scripture,
something that is impossible, after all, since at that point Scripture was
not yet finished. The phrase "word of God" has various meanings in
Scripture, and can refer to the power of God whereby He creates and upholds,
or His revelation to the prophets, or the content of revelation, or the
Gospel proclaimed by the apostles. Nevertheless, it is always a word of God,
which means: never simply a sound, but a power, no mere information but also
an accomplishment of His will, Isa. 55:11. By the word God creates and
upholds the world, Gen. 1:3, Ps. 33:6, 148:5, Isa. 48:13, Rom. 4:17, 2 Cor.
4:6, Heb. 1:3, 11:3, Jesus quiets the sea, Mk. 4:38, heals the sick, Mt.
8:16, casts out demons, 9:6, raised the dead, Luke 7:14, 8:54, John 5:25,28;
11:43, etc. By the word He also works in the moral and spiritual arenas. The
word which God employs to make known and to fulfill His will in moral and
spiritual areas is to be distinguished as law and Gospel. When Jesus appeared
on earth to proclaim the coming of the kingdom promised in the OT (Mk.1:15),
to bring the Gospel of forgiveness and salvation to tax collectors and
sinners, to poor and imprisoned (Mt.5:1f.; 11:5,28-30; Lk.4:18-19; 19:10;
etc.), He came into conflict as a matter of course with the pharisaical,
nomistic view of religion that dominated His time. Yet,
though He rejected the human inventions of the ancients (Mt.5:21f.; 15:9),
and though He had another conception [opvatting] of murder (Mt.5:16),
adultery (5:27), oaths (5:33), fasting (6:16), divorce (Mt.19:9), sabbath
(Mk.2:27), He maintains the entire law, also in its ceremonial particulars
(Mt.5:23,24; 17:24-27; 23:2,3,23; Mk.1:44; 11:16); He explains it in its
spiritual meaning (Mt.5-7), emphasizes its ethical content, defines love
toward God and neighbor as its core (Mt.7:12; 9:13; 12:7; Mk.7:15; 12:28-34),
and desires an other, overflowing righteousness than that of the Pharisees
(Mt.5.20). Though greater than the temple (Mt.12:6), He even placed Himself
under the law (Mt.3:15), and came to fulfill the law and the prophets
(Mt.5:17). And though He never sought to annul the law, He knew that His
disciples are inwardly free from the law (Mt.17:26); that His church is based
not on the law but on the confession of His Messiahship (Mt.16:18); that in
His blood a new covenant is established (Mt.26:28); in a word, that the new
wine demands new wineskins (Mt.9:17), and that the days of the temple, the
nation and the law were numbered (Mk.13:2). Jesus desired no revolutionary
overthrow of the legislative dispensation of the old covenant, but a
reformation and renewal that would be born out of its complete fulfillment. And
so, in fact, it went. The church in Jerusalem at first still held to the
temple and law (Acts 2: 46; 3:1; 10:14; 21:20; 22:12). But a new conception
surfaced. With the conversion of the Gentiles the question arose as to the
significance of the Mosaic law. And Paul was the first to fully understand
that in the death of Christ the handwriting of ordinances was blotted out
(Col.2:14). Paul
always understood by nomos
(except where further qualification pointed elsewhere, e.g., Rom.3:27;
Gal.6:2) the Mosaic law, the entire Torah, including the ceremonial
commandments (Rom.9:4; Gal.2:12; 4:10; 5:3; Phil.3:5-6). And he described
this law not as the letter to the Hebrews does — as imperfect, preparatory,
Old Testamental dispensation of the covenant of grace, which then disappeared
when the high priest and surety of the better covenant arrived — but as the
revelation of God's will, as a religious-ethical demand and obligation, as a
God-willed regulation of the relationship between Himself and man. And
concerning this law, so understood, Paul taught that it is holy and good, and
bestowed by God (Rom.2:18; 7:22,25; 9:4; 2 Cor.3:3,7); but instead of being
able, as the Pharisees argued, to grant righteousness, the law is powerless
through the flesh (Rom.8:3); stimulates desire (Rom.7:7-8); increases the
trespass (Rom.5:20; Gal.3:19); arouses wrath, curse and death (Rom.4:15; 2
Cor.3:6; Gal.3:10); and was merely a temporary insertion, for pedagogical
reasons (Rom.5:20; Gal.3:19,24; 4:2-3). Therefore,
that law has reached its end in Christ, the seed of promise (Rom.10:4); the
believer is free from the law (Gal.4:26f.; 5:1), since he is redeemed through
Christ from the curse of the law (Gal.3:13; 4:5), and shares in the Spirit of
adoption, the Spirit of freedom (Rom.8:15; 2 Cor.3:16-17; Gal.5:18). This
freedom of faith, however, does not invalidate the law, but establishes it
(Rom.3:31), since its legal requirement is fulfilled precisely in those who
walk according to the Spirit (Rom.8:4). After all, that Spirit renews believers
so that they delight in God's law according to the inner man and inquire as
to what God's holy will is (Rom.7:22; 12:2; Eph.5:10; Phil.1:10), while they
are spurred on through various impulses — the great mercy of God, the example
of Christ, the costly price with which they have been purchased, the
fellowship of the Holy Spirit, etc. — to the doing of God's will. 521. This
antithesis between law and Gospel was further intensified and brought into
irreconcilable conflict in the Christian church, on the one hand, by
antinomianism in its various forms of Gnosticism, Manichaeism, Paulicianism,
Anabaptism, Hattemism, etc. The entire OT derived from a lower God, from an
angry, jealous, vengeful God, and was replaced with an entirely different
revelation from the God of love, from the Father of Christ. On
the other hand, the antithesis between law and Gospel was weakened and
obliterated by nomism in its various forms of Pelagianism, Semi-pelagianism, Romanism,
Socinianism, Rationalism, etc. Already by the church fathers, and later by
scholastic and Roman Catholic theologians, law and Gospel were identified
with Old and New Testaments, and then not placed antithetically against one
another, but viewed as a lower and higher revelation of God's will. Law and
Gospel differed not in that the former only demands and the latter only
promises, for both contained commands, threats and promises; musteria,
promissiones, praecepta; res credendae, sperandae et faciendae; not only
Moses, but also Christ was legislator. But in all of this the Gospel of the
NT, or the lex nova, significantly transcended the law of the OT or the lex
vetus; the mysteries (trinity, incarnation, atonement, etc.) are revealed
much more clearly in the NT, the promises are much richer in content and
embrace especially spiritual and eternal goods, the laws are much more
glorious and bearable, since ceremonial and civil laws were annulled and
replaced with just a few rites. Furthermore, the law was given by Moses,
grace and truth came in Jesus Christ. The law was temporary and designed for
one nation; the Gospel is eternal and must be brought to every nation. The
law was imperfect, a shadow and figure; the Gospel is perfect and the
substance of the [promised] goods themselves. The law aroused fear and
slavery, the Gospel arouses love and freedom. The law could not justify in
the full sense of the word; it provided no richness of grace; it bestowed no
eternal salvation; but the Gospel bestows in the sacrament the power of
grace, which enables one to fulfill God's commands and obtain eternal life.
In one word: the law is the incomplete Gospel, the Gospel is the completed
law; the Gospel was contained in the law as the tree is in the seed, as the
full head of grain is in the seed [at this point Bavinck refers to vol. 3,
213f., and to a number of theologians, such as Augustine, Lombard, Aquinas,
the Council of Trent, and Bellarmine]. Now,
to the degree that the Old and New Testament dispensations of the covenant of
grace could be described according to their form which came into view with
the progress of Holy Scripture, by the terms law and Gospel, to that degree
the distinction between both of them that was made by Rome (indeed not in
every respect, yet in the main) is to be approved. Still, Rome identified Old
and New covenant entirely with law and Gospel. She misperceived the Gospel in
the Old Testament and the law in the New Testament. Rome summarized the
entire doctrine proclaimed by Christ and the apostles as Gospel, in which
they included not only promises but also laws and threats. In this way, Rome
made the Gospel into a second law. The Pauline antithesis between law and
Gospel was eliminated. For
though it is true that Paul understood by the law the entire OT dispensation,
he viewed it then precisely in its legislative
[wettischen, "lawish"; italics original] form and in this way
places it in direct contrast it to the Gospel. And when he did that, he
acknowledged that the legislative dispensation in no way invalidated the
promise that had already been given to Abraham (Gal.3:17,21). Moreover, Paul
acknowledged that in the days of the old covenant too the Gospel was
proclaimed (Gal.3:8), and that then, too, righteousness was obtained from and
through faith (Rom.4:11,12; 11:32; Gal.3:6-7). Concerning
the law as law, apart from the promise to which it was made serviceable in
the OT, Paul argued that it could not justify; that it increased sin; that it
was an administration of condemnation which precisely in that way prepared
for the fulfillment of the promise and necessitated an other righteousness,
namely, the righteousness of God in Christ through faith. And
this antithesis of law and Gospel was again understood by the Reformation.
Indeed, the church fathers did make statements that testified to clearer
insight. But no clarity resulted, because they always confused the
distinction between law and Gospel with that between Old and New Testaments. But
the Reformers, while on the one hand maintaining against the Anabaptists the
unity of the covenant of grace in both of its administrations, on the other
hand kept in view the sharp contrast between law and Gospel, and thereby
restored the unique character of the Christian religion as a religion of
grace. Although
law and Gospel can still be employed in a broader sense for the old and new
dispensations of the covenant of grace, in their proper meaning they refer
nonetheless to two revelations of God's will that differ essentially from one
another. The
law, too, is God's will (Rom.2:18,20), holy and wise and good, spiritual
(Rom.7:12,14; 12:10), giving life to whomever keeps it (Rom.2:13; 3:12). But
through sin it has become impotent, and does not justify, but through sin the
law stimulates desire, increases the trespass, effects wrath, kills, curses
and damns (Rom.3:20; 4:15; 5:20; 7:5,8-9,13; 2 Cor.3:6f.; Gal.3:10,13,19). And
over against the law stands the Gospel of Christ, the euangelion, containing nothing less
than the fulfillment of the OT epangelia
(Mk.1:15; Acts 13:32; Eph.3:6), coming to us from God (Rom.1:1-2; 2
Cor.11:7), having Christ as its content (Rom.1:3; Eph.3:6), and bringing
nothing else than grace (Acts 20:24), reconciliation (2 Cor.5:18),
forgiveness (Rom.4:3-8), righteousness (Rom.3:21-22), peace (Eph.6:15),
freedom (Gal.5:13), life (Rom.1:17; Phil.2:16; etc.). Like demand and gift,
like command and promise, like sin and grace, like sickness and healing, like
death and life, so here, too, law and Gospel stand over against one another.
[Here Bavinck has a footnote: From the Protestant side as well the
distinction between law and Gospel is often weakened or obliterated, e.g., by
Stange, Die Heilsbedeutung des Gesetzes, Leipzig 1904; Bruining, already
cited in vol. 3, p. 631. Earlier already by Zwingli,, according to Loofs,
Dogmengeschichte, 4th ed., 799.] Although they overlap to the extent that
they both have God as author, both speak of one and the same perfect
righteousness, both are directed to man, to bring him to eternal life, yet they
differ in that the law proceeds from God's holiness, the Gospel from His
grace; the [works of the] law [are] known from nature, the Gospel only by
special revelation; the law demands perfect righteousness, the Gospel bestows
it; the law leads to eternal life through works, the Gospel makes works
proceed from eternal life bestowed through faith; the law currently condemns
man, the Gospel acquits him; the law is directed to all men, the Gospel only
to those who live under it; etc. It
was in terms of this distinction that differences arose as to whether
preaching for faith and conversion which presented a condition and demand
really should be considered as belonging to the Gospel, or rather (according
to Flacius, Gerhard, Quenstedt, Voetius, Witsius, Coccejus, De Moor, et al.)
to the law. And indeed, in the strictest sense there are in the Gospel no
demands and conditions, but only promises and gifts; faith and conversion
are, just as justification, etc., benefits of the covenant of grace. Still,
the Gospel never appears concretely this way; in practice it is always joined
to the law and in Scripture it was then always woven together with the law.
The Gospel always presupposes the law, and needs it also in its
administration. For it is brought to rational and moral people who before God
are responsible for themselves and therefore must be called to faith and
conversion. The demanding, summoning shape in which the Gospel appears is
borrowed from the law; every person is obliged to take God at His word not
first by the Gospel, but by nature through the law, and thus also to accept
the Gospel in which He speaks to the person. Therefore the Gospel from the
very beginning lays claim to all people, binds them in their consciences,
since that God who speaks in the Gospel is none other than He who in His law
has made Himself known to them. Faith and conversion are therefore demanded
of the person in the name of God's law, by virtue of the relationship in
which the person as a rational creature stands with respect to God; and that
demand is directed not only to the elect and regenerate, but to all men
without distinction. But
faith and conversion are themselves still the content of the Gospel, not
effects or fruits of the law. For the law does demand faith in God in general,
but not that special faith directed to Christ, and the law can effect metameleia, poenitentia, but not metanoia, resipiscentia, which is
rather a fruit of faith. And though by nature a person is obliged to faith
and conversion through the law, precisely because they are the content of the
Gospel one can speak of a law, a command, an obedience of faith (Rom.1:5;
3:27; 1 Jn.3:23), of a being obedient to and judged by the Gospel (Rom.2:16; 10:16),
etc. Viewed
concretely, law and Gospel differ not so much in that the law always meets us
in the form of command and the Gospel in the form of promise, for the law too
has promises and the Gospel too has warnings and obligations. But they differ
especially in content: the law demands that man work out his own
righteousness, while the Gospel invites him to renounce all
self-righteousness and to receive the righteousness of Christ, to which end
it even bestows the gift of faith. Law
and Gospel stand in that relationship not just before and at the point of
conversion; but they continue standing in that relationship throughout the
whole of the Christian life, all the way to the grave. The Lutherans have an
eye almost exclusively for the accusing, condemning work of the law and
therefore know of no greater salvation than liberation from the law. The law
is necessary only on account of sin. According to Lutheran theology, in the
state of perfection there is no law. God is free from the law; Christ was not
subject to the law for Himself at all; the believer no longer stands under
the law. Naturally, the Lutherans speak of a threefold use of the law, not
only of a usus politicus (civilis), to restrain sin, and a usus paedagogicus,
to arouse the knowledge of sin, but also of a usus didacticus, to function
for the believer as a rule of living. But this last usus is nonetheless
necessary simply and only because and insofar as believers are still sinners,
and must still be tamed by the law, and must still be led to a continuing
knowledge of sin. In itself the law ceases with the coming of faith and
grace, and loses all its significance. The
Reformed, however, have thought about this in an entirely different way. The
usus politicus and the usus paedagogicus of the law became necessary only
accidentally because of sin; even with these uses aside, the most important
usus remains, the usus didacticus or normativus. After all, the law is an
expression of God's being. As a human being Christ was subject to the law for
Himself. Before the fall Adam had the law written upon his heart. With the
believer it is again written upon the tablets of his heart by the Holy
Spirit. And all those in heaven will walk according to the law of the Lord. The
Gospel is temporary, but the law is eternal and is restored precisely through
the Gospel. Freedom from the law consists, then, not in the fact that the
Christian has nothing more to do with the law, but lies in the fact that the
law demands nothing more from the Christian as a condition of salvation. The
law can no longer judge and condemn him. Instead he delights in the law of
God according to the inner man and yearns for it day and night. Therefore,
that law must always be preached to the congregation in connection with the
Gospel. Law and Gospel, the whole Word, the full counsel of God, is the
content of preaching. Among Reformed people, therefore, the law occupies a
much larger place than in the teaching of sin, since it is also part of the
teaching of gratitude. [Here Bavinck has a footnote providing bibliographical
references relating to the views of Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Zanchius,
Witsius, De Moor, Vitringa, Schneckenburger, Frank, and Gottschick.] Source: http://Auxesis.net |
