The Calvinist International
After a little delay, we’re back with the next section of the First Catechism in Latin. These questions treat the definition of sin and the Fall. As always, please feel free to do with these as you like. Quaestiones XXX-XXXV xxxi. Quid significat illud “transgressio”? Facere quae mihi interdicit Deus. xxxii. Quid meretur omne peccatum? Ira […]
Some time ago, I animadverted to Niels Hemmingsen’s (who else?) employment of the traditional divisio of mortal and venial sin. There it was clear that, for Hemmingsen, all sins are mortal by nature (sua natura), and so, for the distinction to be useful, it must be recast as having reference, not to an objective difference […]
In his discussion of the First Commandment in the Enchiridion theologicum, Niels Hemmingsen observes that no man satisfies it–as, indeed, is true of the other nine as well. This should cause the mind “to contemplate its own impurity and to recognize its deserved punishment.” The punishment our wickedness deserves in general is the curse; specifically, it […]
I wrote the following in response in a recent discussion elsewhere on this post from last October regarding mortal and venial sin in Niels Hemmingsen’s Enchiridion Theologicum. It got a little long–long enough, I decided, for a blog post. I include it here in case it is of any use as a further exposition and/or clarification. […]
I know it seems like an unlikely source, but while reading Travels With Charley: In Search of America, I came across this entertaining and theologically instructive narrative of a church in Vermont. Steinbeck firmly presents himself as a sinner, and the sermon does not seem to “stick,” at least not as of the writing of […]
In his discussion in the Enchiridion Theologicum of “actual sin” (actuale peccatum), the fruit of “hereditary/original sin,” Niels Hemmingsen makes several divisiones, the first of which may be slightly confusing on an initial reading: the division between mortal and venial sin. While he keeps the traditional terminology, he differentiates the two kinds contingently rather than essentially. He […]
In his Enchiridion Theologicum, Niels Hemmingsen lists the sins he believes to have occurred together (concurrunt) in the Fall of our first parents. He finds that there were eight particular sins present: I. Doubt concerning the Word of God. II. Loss of faith, since they did not believe God when He was threatening punishments. III. Curiosity, […]
In the beginning, everything was whole and pure. Out of his infinite self-possession, God diffused goodness into being, and created this cosmos with human beings at its apex, in a Garden for their first home. In the Garden human beings had everything they needed: food and land, each other, access to the gift of eternal […]