Friday, June 01, 2018

The Fallen Reason




In his work on the Holy Spirit (Works, Vol III) Owen spends a good deal of time considering the fallenness  of human nature because in his view and that of the Reformed  generally the key to the sanctifying work of the Spirit is regeneration. Regeneration is new life from God, not the alteration of our natural states, however noble and useful those states may be. However, in the course of his discussion Owen interestingly while affirming total depravity – that fallenness affects every faculty of the human mind - he does not commit himself to what might be called  uniform depravity. There is a different degree in respect of different faculties. So we find him stating

That the will and affections being more corrupted than the understanding, - as is evident from their opposition unto and defeating of its manifold convictions – no man doth actually apply his mind for the receiving of the things of the Spirit of God to the utmost of that ability which he hath; for all unregenerate men are invincibly impeded therein by the corrupt stubborness and perverseness of their will and affections. (268)

What Owen has to say is based on 1Corinthians 1 and 2. (257 onwards)  So in the case of 1.14, where Paul states that ‘the natural person does not accept the things of the  Spirit  of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned’. The same is true of every natural person notwithstanding their ‘parts’ [talents] and education. Humanity is divided into the ‘spiritual’ and the ‘natural’. The natural man cannot receive the things of the Spirit of God no matter what else is true of him. He cannot understand them, nor receive them.

A person may understand the meaning of the words in which the gospel is expressed, but that is not equivalent to having a ‘spiritual discernment’ of them. What is such a discernment? Owen says that it requires ‘their [that is, the words understood] conformity and agreeableness to the wisdom, holiness, and righteousness of God’. (He cites 1 Cor. 1.23-4)  This discernment is seen as a personal judgment, a recognition of the mind as it benefits from the regenerating work of the Spirit. But not otherwise. And consistently with this Paul wrote ‘The spiritual person judges all thing, but is himself to be judged by no one’. (1 Cor.  2.15) So that he or she is not to take any lessons on such judging from a purely ‘natural’ person, whoever he or she may be.

These ends [of setting forth the gospel in preaching and so on] being the glory of God in Christ, with our deliverance from a state of sin and misery, with a translation into a state of grace and glory, unless we are acquainted with these things, and the aptness, and fitness, and power of the things of the Spirit of God to effect them, we cannot receive them as we ought; and this a natural man cannot do. (261)

This leads Owen to develop the distinction between a two-fold ability a person may be said to receive or understand spiritual things. There are natural powers. The exhortation, promises and threatenings of the gospel shows those who are in their conversion, are not treated like animals or stones, but as having ‘rational minds’.

So “natural impotency” respects the understanding, fallen in Adam. And “moral impotency” respects the will and affections. Yet such impotence regarding the will and affections is “more corrupted than the understanding.” Each of these are  It is interesting that Owen judges that some faculties are more disabled in the Fall, but though all were equal in being disabled, less so in the case of those who were less depraved. As a result of this corruption, there is “no man doth actually apply his mind to receiving the things of the Spirit of God to the utmost of that ability which he hath…. There is not in any of them a due improvement of the capacity of their natural faculties, in the use of means, for the discharge of their duty toward God herein.” (268) Owen says that there is natural inability in the case of the reason, but a moral  ability in the case with the will and the affections.

Such impotency is “absolutely and naturally insuperable.” “This impotency is natural because it consists in the deprivation of the light and power that were originally in the faculties of our minds and understandings.” (267)  “Natural,” because human nature; “the natural capacity of the human faculties of our minds” suffered loss, the loss of its “accidental perfections,” as Owen states later, (285) in the Fall. It is broken and needs repair. It cannot repair itself.


The Context

These comments occur at a place in Owen’s work on regeneration where he has for several pages ruminated about what Paul says about the ‘natural man’ in ICor.1 and to a lesser extent to Jesus’s observations about unbelief in John 6? Owen says that many of these things are ‘the things of a man’. That is, they can be understood by the reason of the unregenerate. ‘These things being in some sense the ‘things’ of a man [an allusion to I Cor.2.11] may be known by the ‘spirit of a man that is in him’. ‘[H]owbeit they cannot be observed and practised according to the mind of God without the aid and assistance of the Holy Ghost’. (259) To the natural man the words of the gospel are not nothing, ‘they are foolishness to him’. ‘They are represented unto him under such a notion as that he will have nothing to do with them.’
(259)

So Owen says that the transmission of the gospel involves it teaching, preaching and receiving from person to person, and something is transmitted.

For instance, ‘That Jesus Christ was crucified’ mentioned by the apostle, 1Cor. 2.2 ) is a proposition whose sense and importance a natural man may understand. And in the due investigation of this sense, and judging thereon concerning truth and falsehood, lies that use of reason in religious things which some would ignorantly confound with an ability of discerning spiritual things in themselves and their own proper nature. This, therefore is granted… None pretend  that men are, in their conversion to God, like stocks and stones, or brute beasts, that have no understanding’.(261) But ‘between the natural capacity of the mind and the act of spiritual discerning there must be an interposition of an effectual work of the Holy Ghost enabling it thereunto’. (262)

Owen mentions this view incidentally, but the distinction is of some importance and interest. ‘Total depravity is a part of the famous ‘TULIP’. `the ‘total’ refers to the totality of the parts or powers of the human soul. People are depraved in all their parts, the totality of them, including especially the will and the affections. Hence the need for regeneration, But it does not follow from depravity in all the parts that each part is depraved to the same intensity. And Owen is expressing the view that the intellect, or reason, is not depraved as intensively as the will and the affections.

The natural man is here allowed to be the rational man, the learned philosopher, one walking by the light of human reason; which complies not with their exception to this testimony who would only such a one as is sensual and given up to brutish affections to be intended…..The apostle in the whole discourse gives an account why so few received the gospel, especially of those who seemed more likely so to do, being wise and learned men, and the gospel no less than the wisdom of God; and the reason hereof he gives from their disability to receive the things of God, and their hatred of them, neither of which can be cured but by the Spirit of Christ.[268]

Can he have meant it?










54 –5 -  2 scientia of god, one of which is superior to the other








                           















  

The Fallen Reason


In his work on the Holy Spirit (Works, Vol III) Owen spends a good deal of time considering the fallenness  of human nature because in his view and that of the Reformed  generally the key to sanctifying work of the Spirit is regeneration. Regeneration is new life from God, not the alteration of our natural states, however noble and useful those states may be. However, in the course of his discussion Owen interestingly while affirming total depravity – that fallenness affects every faculty of the human mind, he does not commit himself to what might be called  uniform depravity. There is a different degree in respect of different faculties. So we find him stating

INSETThat the will and affections being more corrupted than the understanding, - as is evident from their opposition unto and defeating of its manifold convictions – no man doth actually apply his mind for the receiving of the things of the Spirit of God to the utmost of that ability which he hath; for all unregenerate men are invincibly impeded therein by the corrupt stubborness and perverseness of their will and affections. (268)

What Owen has to say is based on 1Corinthians 1 and 2. (257 onwards)  So in the case of 1.14, where Paul states that ‘the natural person does not accept the things of the  Spirit  of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned’. The same is true of every natural person notwithstanding their ‘parts’ (talents) and education. Humanity is divided into the ‘spiritual’ and the ‘natural’. The natural man cannot receive the things of the Spirit of God no matter what else is true of him. He cannot understand them, nor receive them.

A person may understand the meaning of the words in which the gospel is expressed, but that is not equivalent to having a ‘spiritual discernment’ of them. What is such a discernment? Owen says that it requires ‘their [that is, the words understood] conformity and agreeableness to the wisdom, holiness, and righteousness of God’. (He cites 1 Cor. 1.23-4)  This discernment is seen as a personal judgment, a recognition of the mind as it benefits from the regenerating work of the Spirit. But not otherwise. And consistently with this Paul wrote ‘The spiritual person judges all thing, but is himself to be judged by no one’. (1 Cor.  2.15) So that he or she is not to take any lessons on such judging from a purely ‘natural’ person, whoever he or she may be.

INSETThese ends [of setting forth the gospel in preaching and so on] being the glory of God in Christ, with our deliverance from a state of sin and misery, with a translation into a state of grace and glory, unless we are acquainted with these things, and the aptness, and fitness, and power of the things of the Spirit of God to effect them, we cannot receive them as we ought; and this a natural man cannot do. (261)

This leads Owen to develop the distinction between a two-fold ability a person may be said to receive or understand spiritual things. There are natural powers. The exhortation, promises and threatenings of the gospel shows those who are in their conversion, are not treated like animals or stones, but as having ‘rational minds’.

So “natural impotency” respects the understanding, fallen in Adam. And “moral impotency” respects the will and affections. Yet such impotence regarding the will and affections is “more corrupted than the understanding.” Each of these are  It is interesting that Owen judges that some faculties are more disabled in the Fall, but though all were equal in being disabled, less so in the case of those who were less depraved. As a result of this corruption, there is “no man doth actually apply his mind to receiving the things of the Spirit of God to the utmost of that ability which he hath…. There is not in any of them a due improvement of the capacity of their natural faculties, in the use of means, for the discharge of their duty toward God herein.” (268) Owen says that there is natural inability in the case of the reason, but a moral  ability in the case with the will and the affections.

Such impotency is “absolutely and naturally insuperable.” “This impotency is natural because it consists in the deprivation of the light and power that were originally in the faculties of our minds and understandings.” (267)  “Natural,” because human nature; “the natural capacity of the human faculties of our minds” suffered loss, the loss of its “accidental perfections,” as Owen states later, (285) in the Fall. It is broken and needs repair. It cannot repair itself.


The Context

These comments occur at a place in Owen’s work on regeneration where he has for several pages ruminated about what Paul says about the ‘natural man’ in I Cor.1 and to a lesser extent to Jesus’s observations about unbelief in John 6? Owen says that many of these things are ‘the things of a man’. That is, they can be understood by the reason of the unregenerate. ‘These things being in some sense the ‘things’ of a man [an allusion to I Cor.2.11] may be known by the ‘spirit of a man that is in him’. ‘[H]owbeit they cannot be observed and practised according to the mind of God without the aid and assistance of the Holy Ghost’. (259) To the natural man the words of the gospel are not nothing, ‘they are foolishness to him’. ‘They are represented unto him under such a notion as that he will have nothing to do with them.’
(259)

So Owen says that the transmission of the gospel involves it teaching, preaching and receiving from person to person, and something is transmitted.

INSET For instance, ‘That Jesus Christ was crucified’ mentioned by the apostle, 1Cor. 2.2 ) is a proposition whose sense and importance a natural man may understand. And in the due investigation of this sense, and judging thereon concerning truth and falsehood, lies that use of reason in religious things which some would ignorantly confound with an ability of discerning spiritual things in themselves and their own proper nature. This, therefore is granted… None pretend  that men are, in their conversion to God, like stocks and stones, or brute beasts, that have no understanding’.(261) But ‘between the natural capacity of the mind and the act of spiritual discerning there must be an interposition of an effectual work of the Holy Ghost enabling it thereunto’. (262)

Owen mentions this view incidentally, but the distinction is of some importance and interest. ‘Total depravity is a part of the famous ‘TULIP’. `the ‘total’ refers to the totality of the parts or powers of the human soul. People are depraved in all their parts, the totality of them, including especially the will and the affections. Hence the need for regeneration, But it does not follow from depravity in all the parts that each part is depraved to the same intensity. And Owen is expressing the view that the intellect, or reason, is not depraved as intensively as the will and the affections.

INSET The natural man is here allowed to be the rational man, the learned philosopher, one walking by the light of human reason; which complies not with their exception to this testimony who would only such a one as is sensual and given up to brutish affections to be intended…..The apostle in the whole discourse gives an account why so few received the gospel, especially of those who seemed more likely so to do, being wise and learned men, and the gospel no less than the wisdom of God; and the reason hereof he gives from their disability to receive the things of God, and their hatred of them, neither of which can be cured by the Spirit of Christ.

Can he have meant it?










54 –5 -  2 scientia of god, one of which is superior to the other








                           




























The Fallen Reason


In his work on the Holy Spirit (Works, Vol III) Owen spends a good deal of time considering the fallenness  of human nature because in his view and that of the Reformed  generally the key to sanctifying work of the Spirit is regeneration. Regeneration is new life from God, not the alteration of our natural states, however noble and useful those states may be. However, in the course of his discussion Owen interestingly while affirming total depravity – that fallenness affects every faculty of the human mind, he does not commit himself to what might be called  uniform depravity. There is a different degree in respect of different faculties. So we find him stating

INSETThat the will and affections being more corrupted than the understanding, - as is evident from their opposition unto and defeating of its manifold convictions – no man doth actually apply his mind for the receiving of the things of the Spirit of God to the utmost of that ability which he hath; for all unregenerate men are invincibly impeded therein by the corrupt stubborness and perverseness of their will and affections. (268)

What Owen has to say is based on 1Corinthians 1 and 2. (257 onwards)  So in the case of 1.14, where Paul states that ‘the natural person does not accept the things of the  Spirit  of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned’. The same is true of every natural person notwithstanding their ‘parts’ (talents) and education. Humanity is divided into the ‘spiritual’ and the ‘natural’. The natural man cannot receive the things of the Spirit of God no matter what else is true of him. He cannot understand them, nor receive them.

A person may understand the meaning of the words in which the gospel is expressed, but that is not equivalent to having a ‘spiritual discernment’ of them. What is such a discernment? Owen says that it requires ‘their [that is, the words understood] conformity and agreeableness to the wisdom, holiness, and righteousness of God’. (He cites 1 Cor. 1.23-4)  This discernment is seen as a personal judgment, a recognition of the mind as it benefits from the regenerating work of the Spirit. But not otherwise. And consistently with this Paul wrote ‘The spiritual person judges all thing, but is himself to be judged by no one’. (1 Cor.  2.15) So that he or she is not to take any lessons on such judging from a purely ‘natural’ person, whoever he or she may be.

INSETThese ends [of setting forth the gospel in preaching and so on] being the glory of God in Christ, with our deliverance from a state of sin and misery, with a translation into a state of grace and glory, unless we are acquainted with these things, and the aptness, and fitness, and power of the things of the Spirit of God to effect them, we cannot receive them as we ought; and this a natural man cannot do. (261)

This leads Owen to develop the distinction between a two-fold ability a person may be said to receive or understand spiritual things. There are natural powers. The exhortation, promises and threatenings of the gospel shows those who are in their conversion, are not treated like animals or stones, but as having ‘rational minds’.

So “natural impotency” respects the understanding, fallen in Adam. And “moral impotency” respects the will and affections. Yet such impotence regarding the will and affections is “more corrupted than the understanding.” Each of these are  It is interesting that Owen judges that some faculties are more disabled in the Fall, but though all were equal in being disabled, less so in the case of those who were less depraved. As a result of this corruption, there is “no man doth actually apply his mind to receiving the things of the Spirit of God to the utmost of that ability which he hath…. There is not in any of them a due improvement of the capacity of their natural faculties, in the use of means, for the discharge of their duty toward God herein.” (268) Owen says that there is natural inability in the case of the reason, but a moral  ability in the case with the will and the affections.

Such impotency is “absolutely and naturally insuperable.” “This impotency is natural because it consists in the deprivation of the light and power that were originally in the faculties of our minds and understandings.” (267)  “Natural,” because human nature; “the natural capacity of the human faculties of our minds” suffered loss, the loss of its “accidental perfections,” as Owen states later, (285) in the Fall. It is broken and needs repair. It cannot repair itself.


The Context

These comments occur at a place in Owen’s work on regeneration where he has for several pages ruminated about what Paul says about the ‘natural man’ in I Cor.1 and to a lesser extent to Jesus’s observations about unbelief in John 6? Owen says that many of these things are ‘the things of a man’. That is, they can be understood by the reason of the unregenerate. ‘These things being in some sense the ‘things’ of a man [an allusion to I Cor.2.11] may be known by the ‘spirit of a man that is in him’. ‘[H]owbeit they cannot be observed and practised according to the mind of God without the aid and assistance of the Holy Ghost’. (259) To the natural man the words of the gospel are not nothing, ‘they are foolishness to him’. ‘They are represented unto him under such a notion as that he will have nothing to do with them.’
(259)

So Owen says that the transmission of the gospel involves it teaching, preaching and receiving from person to person, and something is transmitted.

INSET For instance, ‘That Jesus Christ was crucified’ mentioned by the apostle, 1Cor. 2.2 ) is a proposition whose sense and importance a natural man may understand. And in the due investigation of this sense, and judging thereon concerning truth and falsehood, lies that use of reason in religious things which some would ignorantly confound with an ability of discerning spiritual things in themselves and their own proper nature. This, therefore is granted… None pretend  that men are, in their conversion to God, like stocks and stones, or brute beasts, that have no understanding’.(261) But ‘between the natural capacity of the mind and the act of spiritual discerning there must be an interposition of an effectual work of the Holy Ghost enabling it thereunto’. (262)

Owen mentions this view incidentally, but the distinction is of some importance and interest. ‘Total depravity is a part of the famous ‘TULIP’. `the ‘total’ refers to the totality of the parts or powers of the human soul. People are depraved in all their parts, the totality of them, including especially the will and the affections. Hence the need for regeneration, But it does not follow from depravity in all the parts that each part is depraved to the same intensity. And Owen is expressing the view that the intellect, or reason, is not depraved as intensively as the will and the affections.

INSET The natural man is here allowed to be the rational man, the learned philosopher, one walking by the light of human reason; which complies not with their exception to this testimony who would only such a one as is sensual and given up to brutish affections to be intended…..The apostle in the whole discourse gives an account why so few received the gospel, especially of those who seemed more likely so to do, being wise and learned men, and the gospel no less than the wisdom of God; and the reason hereof he gives from their disability to receive the things of God, and their hatred of them, neither of which can be cured by the Spirit of Christ.

Can he have meant it?