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Johannes Polyander and the inefficacious internal call: An Arminian compromise?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 March 2023
Abstract
In the thirtieth disputation of the Leiden Synopsis (1622), Johannes Polyander elucidates what he considers to be the Reformed doctrine of vocatio. In his explanation of this doctrine, Polyander makes surprising statements concerning the internal call. He teaches that not only the external call, but also the internal call can come to the reprobate. It does not do so all the time, but it does so sometimes, especially in the sphere of the covenant. Yet, when it does, that internal call is ineffectual. This doctrine of an ineffectual internal call is not found in the Canons of Dordt (1618–19), nor in disputations held before the cycle of disputations that became the Leiden Synopsis. Was Polyander's view a compromise with Arminianism? Or was Polyander actually defending Dordt's doctrine? This article builds on Henk van Den Belt's cursory conclusion to this question by providing proof that Polyander was in fact defending Dordt.
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- Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press
References
1 The Synod of Dordt is dated 1618–19. The Synopsis was published in 1625.
2 van den Belt, Henk, ‘The Vocatio in the Leiden Disputations (1597–1631): The Influence of the Arminian Controversy on the Concept of the Divine Call to Salvation’, Church History and Religious Culture 92/4 (2012), p. 546Google Scholar.
3 van den Belt, Henk et al. , Synopsis Purioris Theologiae/Synopsis of a Purer Theology: Latin Text and English Translation, 3 vols (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 2:223CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 Ibid.
5 Ibid.
6 Ibid., p. 221. See also thesis 37 (2:223): ‘To other people the Holy Spirit offers a little taste of his grace so that their hearts are touched by a momentary feeling of happiness. These receive the gospel like seed on rocky soil.’ This ‘taste of His grace’ does not imply saving intentions, as will be shown below.
7 Polyander refers specifically to Hebrews 6:6 in thesis 40 when speaking of the gifts that flow to hypocrites when the internal ineffective call comes to them along with the external call.
8 Van den Belt, ‘The Vocatio’, p. 548.
9 Ibid.
10 Ibid., p. 549.
11 See n. 2 above.
12 van den Belt, ‘The Vocatio’ p. 552.
13 As noted above.
14 To situate the timing of this disputation, 1609 is nine years after Gomarus held the same disputation in Leiden, nine years before the Synod of Dordt, sixteen years before the Leiden Synopsis was published.
15 Arminius, Jacobus, The Writings of James Arminius, 3 vols, ed. Nichols, James (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1956), 1:15Google Scholar.
16 Ibid., p. 573.
17 Ibid.
18 Olson, Roger E., Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2009), p. 164Google Scholar.
19 Ibid., p. 163.
20 James Arminius and Carl Bangs, The Works of James Arminius: The London Edition, 3 vols, trans. James Nichols and William Nichols (Grand Rapids, MI.: Baker, 1986), 2:721. The ‘Certain Articles to be Diligently Examined and Weighed’ were published posthumously. No one knows exactly when they were written. See Bangs, Carl, Arminius: A Study in the Dutch Reformation (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 1998), p. 332Google Scholar.
21 Ibid.
22 Ibid.
23 Arminius, Writings of Arminius, 1:253–4.
24 Episcopius, Simon, The Arminian Confession of 1621, ed. and trans. Ellis, Mark (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications, 2005), pp. 105–10Google Scholar.
25 Episcopius, Arminian Confession, p. 108. N.b., not ‘only cause’ but ‘primary cause’.
26 Ibid., p. 109.
27 Ibid.
28 Ibid., p. 106.
29 Ibid., p. 108.
30 Ibid.
31 Schaff, Philip, The Creeds of Christendom: The Evangelical Protestant Creeds, with Translations (New York: Harper, 1919), p. 589Google Scholar.
32 Ibid., p. 590.
33 ‘Johannes Polyander’, Prabook World Biographical Encyclopedia; https://prabook.com/web/johannes.polyander/2218573, accessed 29 November 2021.
34 Barfoot, C. C. and Todd, Richard, The Great Emporium: The Low Countries as a Cultural Crossroads in the Renaissance and the Eighteenth Century (Atlanta, GA: Rodopi, 1992), p. 90CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
35 Ibid.
36 Bangs, Jeremy, ‘Johannes Polyander: Een Dienaar van Kerk En Universiteit: EBSCOhost’, Church History 52/3 (Sept. 1983), p. 375Google Scholar.
37 Goudriaan, Aza and van Lieburg, Fred (eds), Revisiting the Synod of Dordt (1618–1619) (Leiden: Brill, 2010), p. 299Google Scholar.
38 Bangs, ‘Johannes Polyander’, p. 375.
39 Ibid. The attack was published in 1616.
40 Van den Belt et al., Synopsis, 1:2.
41 Ibid., n. 3.
42 Ibid., p. 227. ‘Conviction of stubborn disobedience’ is hardening. Though this is termed an ‘accidental goal’ by Polyander, that is, a goal not essential as the main goal of the calling, it is nonetheless a goal. The importance of that word is seen below.
43 Arminius, Works of Arminius: London Edition, 2:721.
44 Arminius, Writings of Arminius, p. 574 (emphasis added).
45 As quoted above.
46 Episcopius, Arminian Confession, p. 110.
47 Arminius, Writings of Arminius, 1:571.
48 Van den Belt, ‘The Vocatio’, p. 555.
49 Van den Belt et al., Synopsis, 2:219.
50 Ibid., p. 225.
51 De Jong, P. Y. (ed.), Crisis in the Reformed Churches: Essays in Commemoration of the Great Synod of Dordt, 1618–1619 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformed Fellowship, 1968), pp. 226–7Google Scholar; emphasis added. The Remonstrants defined the serious call as ‘intention and will to save’. Contrast this with the Canons, which define the seriousness and genuineness of the call as instead, ‘For God hath most earnestly and truly shown in His Word what is pleasing to Him, namely, that those who are called should come to Him’ (i.e. the will of His command). See also Blacketer, Raymond, ‘The Three Points in Most Parts Reformed: A Reexamination of the So-Called Well-Meant Offer of Salvation’, Calvin Theological Journal 35/1 (Apr. 2000), pp. 41–2Google Scholar. The Opinions of the Remonstrants were likely written at least in their final form by Jan Uytenbogaert.
52 John W. Beardslee et al., Reformed Dogmatics: J. Wollebius, G. Voetius, F. Turretin (Oxford: OUP, 1965), p. 11.
53 Ibid., p. 158.
54 Ibid., p. 160.
55 Ibid., p. 161.
56 Ibid., p. 116.
57 Ibid., p. 160.
58 Ibid., p. 116; emphasis added.
59 Making reference to the reprobate not being called ‘according to His purpose’ is significant in this regard as well. This speaks to God's lack of intention to save. Turretin explains, ‘They who are called with the intention of salvation are “called according to purpose” because that intention is the act of election and the effecting of the purpose. Now it is certain that no reprobates are called according to purpose because thus they would both love God and be necessarily justified, etc (v. 30), which cannot be said of them.’ Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 3 vols, ed. James T. Dennison, Jr., trans. George Musgrave Giger (Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 1994), 2:506.
60 Beardslee, Reformed Dogmatics, p. 159.
61 Blacketer, ‘The Three Points in Most Parts Reformed’, p. 59.
62 Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 2:507.
63 Ibid., p. 502.
64 ‘Third Question: Sufficient Grace. Is sufficient, subjective, and internal grace give to each and every one? We deny against the Romanists, Socinians, and Arminians.’ Ibid., p. 510.
65 Ibid., p. 511.
66 Ibid.
67 Ibid.
68 Ibid., p. 504.
69 Ibid., pp. 504–5.
70 Ibid., p. 511.
71 Ibid., 512–3.
72 Van den Belt et al., Synopsis, 2:209.
73 Ibid.