De gratia Redemptoris

Justification (δικαίωσις), by the force of the term, is the act of justifying; it can also be understood terminatively, or passively, for the effect which that act has in the one who is justified.

Just (δίκαιος) is said of a person, a thing, an act, which agrees with the norm of morals¹. Justice (δικαιοσύνη) is that quality or condition of a person or thing by which it is conformed to the norm of morals, to the law, to the divine will. In a restricted sense it is understood of the virtue which renders to each his own. The justice of God is either that by which he himself is just (Dei = genitive of possession), or that which proceeds from God, by which he makes us just (Dei = genitive of origin). To justify (δικαιόω), by analogy with the other verbs ending in — οω (τυφλόω = I make blind), can mean to make just; thus, as will appear from the argument of Sacred Scripture, in the New Testament. Yet in this sense it does not occur among profane authors, which is easily understood; for by nature a man cannot make another man just. For profane authors, then, to justify is to visit with punishments or rewards, to punish or to reward; besides, to esteem or judge something just; among the LXX the forensic use is frequent, for the act by which a judge absolves someone of a crime, declares him just, or declares which party the law favours.

The words of the thesis are taken from session 6, chapter 7 of the Council of Trent. For the innovators of the sixteenth century wholly overthrew the catholic sense of justification². According to them, in justification (through faith) the justice of Christ becomes our justice; as original sin is alien to us, so also is the justice by which we are justified: the justice of Christ is imputed to us. Nor is sin truly and perfectly destroyed in us in this justification, but it passes away in guilt and remains in act; that is, although we are truly sinners and sin remains in act in us, nevertheless God wills mercifully to spare us; the force of sin, which is to accuse, to condemn, to set an angry God before us, is taken away; in other words: sin remains, but is no longer imputed: before God the Father we are reckoned holy and just. Regeneration, vivification, the renewal of man do not belong to this justification but are distinguished from it; this follows the justification of faith and is its fruit, if faith is living and not dead.

From the opposition to these errors the doctrine stated in the thesis is easily understood. The sinner is unjust and an enemy of God. Justification is a true and properly so-called remission of sins; a true remission, not merely the non-imputation of a sin that in fact remains, but sin itself ceases in man, is truly destroyed, is no longer present. Sins are understood here as those by which a man is truly made unjust, original sin and personal mortal sins. These, as is clear, are not to be conceived as though the act of sin itself, once performed, were made undone, but the guilt contracted by that act and the stain brought upon the soul are wholly taken away. Justification is further said to be the sanctification and renewal of the inner man; therefore man not only ceases to be a sinner, but is positively transferred to a higher state.

Sanctity means internal sanctity, by which a man is not only held to be holy and just but is inwardly constituted holy — that sanctity, as is clear, which alone is had in the present order; renewal, that is, the passage from the former state to a new and better one, which consists in this, that man be truly just, a friend of God, and an heir according to the hope of eternal life, who can and ought by right to hope for eternal life promised to him as to a friend of God.

Both the remission of sin and the internal renewal are had in justification itself. But what relation exists between them is not yet treated in this place; in fact one is not had without the other: sin is not remitted without sanctification and renewal, nor is the renewal and sanctification of the sinner without the remission of sin. Nor does this thesis yet determine more accurately in what that sanctification and renewal consists.

Briefly, then, it can be said: the Protestants defend an imputed justice, catholics an internal justice of their own, inherent in the justified man himself.

A middle view, as it were, has also been proposed: some Protestants (Martin Butzer) admitted, besides imputed justice, a certain inherent justice. Some catholics too (Contarini, Pigge, Gropper, the “Colonienses”) proposed a doctrine of a “double justice”. This is found in the book “Interim” (1541); in the “Antididagma” (Cologne 1544, f. 13) it is stated thus: “We are justified by God by a double justice as it were through formal and essential causes. Of these the one and the prior is the consummated justice of Christ, not indeed as it is outside us in him, but as and when the same is imputed to us for justice (so long, that is, as it is apprehended by faith). This very justice of Christ thus imputed to us is the chief and highest cause of our justification, on which we ought principally to rest and to trust. In another way, however, we are formally justified by an inherent justice, which is given, infused and made our own together with the remission of sins, the renewal of the Holy Spirit and the diffusion of charity into our hearts, according to the measure of each one's faith. Yet upon this inherent justice (because it is imperfect) we do not principally rest”. In the Council of Trent the question of the double justice, which Seripando especially defended, was proposed for discussion in this form:

“Whether the justified man, who has performed good works out of grace and divine help, deriving from the merits of our Lord Jesus Christ, so that he has retained inherent justice, presenting himself with it before the tribunal of Christ, is to be reckoned to have satisfied the divine justice unto the merit and acquisition of eternal life; or whether with this inherent justice he further needs the mercy and justice of Christ, that is, the merit of his passion, whereby the defects of his justice may be supplied, which justice is communicated by divine dispensation according to the measure of faith and charity”³. The Council rejected the doctrine of the double justice; therefore, after it had said in ch. 7: “the sole formal cause (of justification) is the justice of God, not that by which he himself is just, but that by which he makes us just, by which... we are not only reputed, but are truly named and are just, receiving justice in ourselves, each one his own”⁴, it teaches in ch. 16: “nothing further is to be believed wanting to the justified themselves, so that they be reckoned to have fully satisfied the divine law by those works which have been done in God, according to the state of this life, and truly to have merited eternal life, to be obtained also in its own time (if nevertheless they depart in grace)... Thus neither is our own justice set up as though it were of ourselves, nor is the justice of God ignored or rejected; for the justice that is called ours, because we are justified by it as inherent in us, that same is God's, because it is infused into us by God through the merit of Christ”⁵.

THE CHURCH'S DOCUMENTS

Leo X condemned the proposition of Luther: “To deny that sin remains in a child after baptism is to tread under foot both Paul and Christ”⁶.

The Council of Trent, in session 6, defined this doctrine. Ch. 7: Justification “is not the remission of sins alone, but also the sanctification and renewal of the inner man... whence man from unjust is made just and from an enemy a friend, that he may be an heir according to the hope of eternal life... we are not only reputed, but are truly named and are just, receiving justice in ourselves, each one his own... in justification itself, together with the remission of sins, man receives all these things infused at once...”⁷.

Can. 11: “If anyone says that men are justified either by the imputation of the justice of Christ alone, or by the remission of sins alone, to the exclusion of grace and charity, which is poured forth into their hearts by the Holy Spirit and inheres in them, or even that the grace by which we are justified is only the favour of God: let him be anathema”⁸.

In session 5, in the decree on original sin, it had already laid down: “If anyone denies that by the grace of Jesus Christ our Lord, which is conferred in baptism, the guilt of original sin is remitted, or even asserts that the whole of that which has the true and proper nature of sin is not taken away, but says that it is only shaved off or not imputed: let him be anathema; for in those who are reborn God hates nothing...”⁹.

Pius V condemned the propositions of Baius: 42. “The justice by which the ungodly is justified through faith consists formally in obedience to the commandments, which is the justice of works...” 43. “In men doing penance before the sacrament of absolution, and in catechumens before baptism, there is true justification, separated however from the remission of sins”¹⁰.

SACRED SCRIPTURE

A true remission of sins: Act 3, 19: “Repent therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out”. Ἐξαλείφειν means to wipe out; it is used of a writing that is to be blotted out, Col 2, 14: blotting out... the handwriting of the decree; Apoc 3, 5: I will not blot out his name from the book of life. Cf. Is 43, 25; Ps 50, 3. — 1 Cor 6, 11: “And such (namely sinners) were some of you; but you are washed (properly: you have taken care to wash yourselves), but you are sanctified, but you are justified”. By washing, stains are removed, not merely covered. — Rom 5, 19: “For as by the disobedience of one man many were constituted sinners, so also by the obedience of one many shall be constituted just”. As true sin (which the Protestants themselves concede), so also true justice; therefore it is no longer sin. — Rom 8, 1: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus”. Cf. Eph 5, 25 ss.; from the Old Testament 1 Par 21, 8; 2 Reg 12, 13; Ps 102, 12.

They are renewed: Baptism is the laver of regeneration and renovation: Tit 3, 5. On this regeneration Io 1, 3; 3, 6; 1 Io 2, 29; 3, 9; 4, 7; 5, 1. 4. 18; 1 Petr 1, 3. 23. (See the following thesis.) Before regeneration man is the old man (παλαιός, the former): Rom 6, 6; Eph 4, 22; Col 3, 9. By this word is indicated both the corruption of the former state and that something new succeeds it. After regeneration he is the new man: Rom 6, 4, newness of life (καινότης); they put on the new man Eph 4, 24 (καινός); Col 3, 9 (νέος); cf. Gal 3, 27, to put on Christ; they are renewed: Col 3, 10 (ἀνακαινούμενον); Eph 4, 23 (ἀνανεοῦσθαι). And so there is talk of a new creature: Gal 6, 15 (καινὴ κτίσις); 2 Cor 5, 17: if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; cf. Iac 1, 18. But such a renewal cannot be understood except as a real, true change in the man himself. And this is had by baptism, the laver of renovation.

They are justified: Rom 3, 24: “Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus”. Rom 3, 28, justification through faith; cf. Gal 2, 16. 17; Rom 5, 1, from faith; Rom 5, 9, in his blood; Rom 5, 19, “they shall be constituted just”; 1 Cor 6, 11: “you are justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God”; Tit 3, 7: “justified by his grace”. These things cannot be understood in the sense that men are merely reputed or declared just, while in fact they are not inwardly just; for 1) the discourse is of a justification to which man cooperates, and which is the effect of redemption; 2) Rom 5, 19 has a parallelism between constituting a sinner and constituting a just man; but sinners are constituted really and not only imputatively; therefore the same must be said of their being constituted just; 3) much less can these things be so understood when one attends to the rest of the doctrine of Sacred Scripture (sins are truly blotted out, man is inwardly renewed); 4) God, who is truthful, cannot declare or repute just one who is not truly just.

But the justice which is thus communicated is the justice of God, namely that which is from God, which has God for its author, Phil 3, 9¹¹.

A friend of God: on this friendship between God and the just man there is fuller treatment in the treatise on charity.

An heir according to the hope of eternal life: Tit 3, 7.

THE FATHERS

Several texts of the holy Fathers are found in Rouet de Iournel, Ench. Patr., ser. 355, 356, 360, 361, from which we select some; cf. also what is proposed on this matter in the treatise on Baptism and on Penance.

Sins are blotted out: ST JUSTIN: “If they do penance, all who will can obtain mercy from God, and the Scripture proclaims them blessed, saying: Blessed is he to whom the Lord has not imputed sin. That is, if he repents of his sins, he receives from God the remission of his sins; but not, as you deceive yourselves and certain others like you in this, who say that even if they are sinners, provided they have known God, the Lord does not impute sin to them”¹²

ST AUGUSTINE: “We say that baptism gives the pardon of all sins, and takes away crimes, does not shave them off; nor is it that the roots of all sins are retained in the evil flesh, as though in the case of the hairs of those who are shaved on the head, whence the sins that are again to be cut back may grow”¹³. “You affirm that I have said that grace does not perfectly make the new man. I do not say this; attend to what I say. Grace perfectly makes the new man, since it even leads him to the immortality of the body and to full felicity. Now too it perfectly renews man, as far as pertains to liberation from all sins whatsoever, not as far as pertains to liberation from all evils and from all the corruption of mortality, by which the body now weighs down the soul”¹⁴. “But you, who think that if concupiscence were an evil, the baptized would be free of it, are much mistaken. He is free of every sin, not of every evil. Which is said more plainly thus: he is free of every guilt of all evils, not of all evils”¹⁵. ST GREGORY THE GREAT: “He therefore who says that sins are not utterly forgiven in baptism, let him say that the Egyptians did not truly die in the Red Sea. But if he confesses that the Egyptians truly died, he must needs confess that sins utterly die in baptism, because surely in our absolution the truth avails more than the shadow of the truth”¹⁶.

Men are renewed: EPISTLE OF BARNABAS: “Where therefore he renewed us by the remission of sins, he made us that we might have another form, a soul namely after the manner of children, inasmuch as he refashioned us”¹⁷. “But it shall be built in the name of the Lord: take heed that the temple of the Lord be built magnificently. How? Learn. Having received the remission of sins and having hope in the name of the Lord, we are made new, created again afresh; therefore in us, in our dwelling, God truly dwells”¹⁸. ST CYRIL OF JERUSALEM: “The water is poured around outwardly, and the Spirit inwardly washes the soul without failing. And why do you marvel? Take a bodily example, small indeed and lowly, but useful for the simpler sort. If fire, passing through the thickness of iron, works so great a thing within, so that the iron becomes fire, and the cold becomes hot, and the black becomes shining; if fire, which is a body, penetrating into the body of iron, thus works without hindrance, why do you marvel if the Holy Spirit enters into the inmost soul?”¹⁹. ST JOHN CHRYSOSTOM: “Just as if someone should melt down again a golden statue, defiled by time, smoke, dust and rust, he restores it to us most pure and shining, so also God has melted down our nature again, deprived of that beauty which he had himself put into it from the beginning, casting it into the waters as into a furnace and sending in the grace of the Spirit in place of fire, and thence he brings out the renewed, contending in splendour with the rays of the sun, the old man being crushed and the new man fashioned more splendid than the old was”²⁰.

Heirs of the heavenly kingdom: ST JOHN CHRYSOSTOM: “For they are not only free but also holy, not only holy but also just, not only just but also sons, not only sons but also heirs, not only heirs but also brothers of Christ, and not only brothers of Christ but also co-heirs, not only co-heirs but also members, not only members but also a temple, not only a temple but also organs of the Spirit. You see how many are the bounties of baptism, and yet some reckon that heavenly grace consists in the remission of sins alone; but we have counted ten honours”²¹.

A friend: ST JOHN CHRYS.: “If then this faith has saved you, keep it also now; for what has conferred so many good things on you will without doubt not deceive you concerning things to come. For that which made the dead man, the lost man, the captive and the enemy a friend, a son, a free man, a just man and a co-heir, and furnished him with such great things as no one had ever expected — how, after such liberality and benevolence, will it not receive you hereafter?”²²

Objections

1. Ps 31, 1. 2. “Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man to whom the Lord has not imputed sin, nor is there guile in his spirit”. The same is cited in Rom 4, 7. 8. Therefore sins are only covered, not imputed. — I answer. From what has been said in the argument from Sacred Scripture, it cannot have this sense in St Paul. Nor in the Psalm itself: before God something can be covered only in such a way, that is, withdrawn from the eyes, that it is no longer present; and because the sin is no longer present, God no longer thinks of it, that is, does not impute it.

2. 1 Petr 4, 8: “Charity covers a multitude of sins”. — I answer. The sense is: charity towards the neighbour brings it about that we dissemble the sins of others, do not attend to them; the discourse is not of the remission of one's own sins through charity; cf. Prov 10, 12; 1 Cor 13, 7.

3. To justify signifies to declare just. — I answer. It can have this sense: I grant; it always has it: I deny.

4. Rom 4, 3. 9, the discourse is of the justice of Abraham imputed. — I answer. The discourse is not of imputed justice, but faith is imputed unto justice, that is, the justice of Abraham is not from his works but from faith.

5. We are justified not by our justice but by the justice of God or of Christ (1 Cor 1, 30; 2 Cor 5, 21; Phil 3, 9); therefore the justice of Christ is imputed to us. I answer. It is not our justice, because it is not from our merit and our works but from the merit of Christ, and is conferred on us freely by God: I grant; it is not our justice, because it is not internal and proper to us: I deny. Through the merits of Christ we are justified freely, inwardly and truly by God.

6. If we were justified by our own justice, we could place our confidence in ourselves. — I answer. If it were our own, that is, from our merits alone: I grant; if it is our own, that is, internal to us, but from the merits of Christ: I deny.

For more objections see Beraza, De gratia Christi, nr. 715 ss.