Alan D. Strange, Imputation of the Active Obedience of Christ in the Westminster Standards. Explorations in Reformed Confessional Theology. Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2019. Pp. xviii + 154. $10.00 (paperback).

The rush of books, articles, reviews, and even a hymnal that has flowed from the pen (or, more likely, keyboard) of Dr. Alan D. Strange has been a most appreciated and welcomed gift to the church. His latest work is no exception as it takes up the vital gospel issue of the imputation of the active obedience of Christ—“no hope without it,” voiced the dying Machen. Strange’s focus is primarily historical, investigating the Westminster Assembly and the Westminster Standards, but this does not keep him from skillfully integrating this history with precise dogmatic formulations, warm pastoral exhortations, penetrating polemical argumentations, and judicious ecclesiastical implications—a truly masterful feat that is both academic and devotional, for both the classroom and the coffeehouse.

Strange’s stated aim is to advance the argument that “while the Assembly may never have explicitly affirmed active obedience in what it finally adopted, nonetheless, the Westminster documents, taken as a whole, tend to affirm it” (2). He seeks to accomplish this by carefully considering both the original intent of the framers of the Westminster Assembly and the animus imponentis, that is, the way in which subsequent ecclesiastical assemblies have understood the Standards (128-29). In his own words:

It is my contention, however, that a few lacunae remain which, when examined, will fill in the picture and permit us to see more clearly that the Assembly affirmed active obedience when it specifically addressed the issue. Although the final language of the Assembly’s documents may not have reflected it as some other formulations do (such as the Savoy Declaration of 1658), they reflect a two-covenant structure that affirms (indeed, that entails and requires…) the doctrine of active obedience. Furthermore, I will argue that the original intent of the Westminster divines favors active obedience, as does the interpretation and application of those standards over the years of those churches that have adopted them (in other words, the animus imponentis favors such an affirmation). Moreover, the Assembly’s constitution as a body to give advice to Parliament rather than as a ruling body of the church materially affected how it did its work; consideration of this is relevant in a variety of controversies, including the question of whether the Assembly affirmed active obedience. (3)

But before arriving in Westminster Abbey in the 17th century, Strange excavates the ancient and medieval church to find seeds of the doctrine of Christ’s active obedience. While some (like Norman Shepherd) have denied any such antecedents, Strange demonstrates that such denial is wrongheaded. In the early church, Irenaeus’s recapitulation theory, anticipated by Justin Martyr, included Christ obeying where Adam disobeyed, and Athanasius’s reasoning for the incarnation expressed the positive need for Christ to fulfill the law “that stood in danger of never being fulfilled because of the sin of Adam and his progeny” (22). In the medieval church, theologians such as Hugh, Lombard, Alexander of Hales, Aquinas, Duns Scotus, and Biel contended that Christ had no need to merit anything for himself, which implies that what he did merit, he merited for us. 

Strange further observes that any historical survey of the doctrine of active obedience must consider not only the doctrine of Christ, but also the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. In fact, it was when the Westminster divines were addressing the latter at the Assembly that the debate about active obedience commenced. The doctrine of the Holy Spirit did not come into its own until the Reformation—most notably with Calvin, whom Warfield knighted “the theologian of the Holy Spirit.” This explains why “the imputation of the active obedience of Christ, which is distinctly the work of the Holy Spirit, received comparatively little attention until the Reformation”: the church had yet to enjoy the proper categories by which to understand the doctrine more robustly (29-30).

In the Reformation, the seeds of active obedience are found in Luther and Melanchthon, which eventually bloomed in their successors, like Martin Chemnitz, and in the Formula of Concord (3.14-15). Calvin may not have clearly distinguished the active from the passive obedience of Christ, but there is considerable evidence that he “does teach a doctrine of the imputation of Christ’s righteousness that includes what later writers distinguished into Christ’s active and passive obedience” (35). This would be stated more explicitly by his successor, Theodore Beza, as well as in the Heidelberg Catechism 60-61 and the Belgic Confession article 22. Johannes Piscator “became the first, particularly in response to the affirmation of Beza, to argue that the imputation of Christ’s righteousness was restricted to His obedience in making satisfaction for the sins of His people” (38). But many Reformed theologians rose to oppose him and affirm active obedience, including the international French Reformed synods of Privas (1612) and Tonneins (1614). Lastly, the Irish Articles of 1615, the most immediate antecedent to Westminster, explicitly affirmed Christ’s active obedience in articles 30, 34, and 35.

This brings us to the heart of Strange’s book in which the debate over active obedience at the Westminster Assembly in 1643 is carefully documented and analyzed within its historical, political, and ecclesiastical context. The Assembly’s original task was not to draft a new confession of faith, but to revise the Thirty-Nine Articles, in which only a single article, article 11, treated justification. This article “had to bear the entire weight of all the major aspects of the doctrine of justification.” The divines, therefore, had relatively brief space, putting precision at a premium (51-52). In this context, the word whole (to qualify Christ’s obedience) carried significant weight as short hand for affirming active obedience.

A heated and drawn-out debate ensued over that weighty word, whole, but when it finally came to a vote, only three or four men out of fifty voted against affirming active obedience. Furthermore, their reasons for opposing it were not owing in the least to a desire “to introduce any element of human merit or works (as a part of our faithfulness) into the equation of our justification” (61). Rather, the minority opposition was mainly owing to fear of antinomianism, “the main theological error among Protestants” at that time (56-57). Yet, despite the potential misuse of the affirmation of active obedience, the Assembly affirmed it anyway, for they believed such “to be at the heart of the gospel” (58).

Thus, the Assembly in its initial debate overwhelmingly affirmed active obedience. Why then is the precise language of whole obedience absent from the Standards they later drafted? Strange answers,

[A]ctive obedience was affirmed in the revision of article 11 in 1643, and there is no reason to suppose that it was not also affirmed in WCF 11 and in the other relevant chapters of the WCF, even though the specific wording of revised article 11 never again appears. It is my contention that it did not need to appear in that form because the wording of WCF 11.3 and 8.5 did everything that the revision of article 11 by the addition of the word whole was intended to do (and arguably more). (67)

Strange supports his thesis with a survey of the Westminster Standards to demonstrate the ubiquitous presence of active obedience, despite the absence of the exact wording of whole obedience. Furthermore, he provides a global perspective of the Standards in terms of its covenant theology, showing how the system of doctrine contained therein falls apart when active obedience is denied. He correctly points out that those who deny active obedience today will “not stop at a mere denial of active obedience; they would likely have problems with the whole theological scheme of Westminster, of which active obedience is merely an important plank” (136). In other words, active obedience is not something one can reject without doing substantial damage to the whole system, and those who do “are wanting as Reformed theologians” (136-37).

The bulk of the book has been concerned with the original intent of the framers of the Westminster Assembly, but Strange concludes with an important consideration of the animus imponentis in the final chapter. To give just a cursory overview: both the PCA and OPC have had committees address the broader question of justification in which active obedience was affirmed. This is on par with judicatories in both denominations requiring the affirmation of limited atonement, despite the original intent being unclear. “Similarly,” says Strange, “the recent reports of committees erected by such bodies also testify that an animus has developed in the church that reads our standards to require the affirmation of active obedience, even as they routinely require the affirmation of the doctrine of limited atonement” (134). A similar animus is also evidenced in the PCA, OPC, RCUS, OCRC, URCNA, and RPCNA who have received committee reports that “have either condemned FV [Federal Vision] and NPP [New Perspective on Paul] errors or have adopted statements that reaffirm and highlight confessional statements that militate against positions of at least some of their supporters” and affirm active obedience (137n10).

The compact size of this book would be a false indication of its massive achievement in historical and confessional theology. In a word, it punches well above its weight-class, especially in contemporary debates concerning justification, like Federal Vision. Strange’s thesis that the Westminster Assembly and Standards affirm the imputation of the active obedience of Christ is carefully and persuasively argued. This volume will be of great service to the church in her task to guard the good deposit of the gospel.

Dr. Alan D. Strange has graced Christ the Center on numerous occasions, including an interview on the book reviewed above:

• The Imputation of Active Obedience in the Westminster Standards
• History and the Life of the Church
• The Spirituality of the Church in the Ecclesiology of Charles Hodge
• Charles Hodge and the Spirituality of the Church
• Confessional Subscription and the Animus Imponentis

God’s sovereignty and man’s freedom are often thought to be in competition with one another in a sort of zero-sum game: either God is sovereign or I am free. This has led to thinking that there are only two basic options on the table from which to choose:

Option #1: God’s sovereignty is limited by man’s freedom. Man’s moral and rational capacities are withdrawn from the eternal decree of God and given an independent and autonomous significance and existence. Option #2: Man’s freedom is eliminated by God’s sovereignty. Man’s moral and rational capacities are wholly determined by the eternal decree of God and cease to have any real significance or existence at all.

The first option is correctly labeled “Arminianism.” The second option is often thought to be the teaching of “Calvinism,” but is actually in fundamental disagreement with Calvinism. It is a kind of fatalism or determinism, which Calvinism has properly rejected full force. Both options fail to maintain the basic Creator-creature distinction, which has led to the assumption that God’s freedom and man’s freedom are qualitatively the same. Hence, the zero-sum game. Accordingly, where one is free the other is not. So while options 1 and 2 seem to affirm totally opposite positions, they are actually both situated on the same rationalistic spectrum, just at opposite ends. Calvinism rejects this rationalistic spectrum entirely and provides us with a third option that is most consistent and faithful to God’s revelation in Scripture.

Option #3: Man’s freedom is established by God’s sovereignty. Man’s moral and rational capacities are created and maintained within the eternal decree of God and therefore have real existence and significance.

Whereas options 1 and 2 begin with man’s reasoning, Calvinism begins with God’s Word. It does not claim to solve the mystery, but properly relates God’s sovereignty and human freedom as friends, not enemies. God’s sovereignty does not eliminate man’s freedom, nor does man’s freedom limit God’s sovereignty, instead God’s sovereignty establishes man’s freedom. This is encapsulated in the Westminster Confession of Faith:

God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass: yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin, nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established (3.1).

Herman Bavinck also avoids the rationalism that would set God’s freedom and man’s freedom in opposition to one another, rather than understanding the former to “create” and “maintain” the latter.

“If God and his human creatures can only be conceived as competitors, and if the one can only retain his freedom and independence at the expense of the other, then God has to be increasingly restricted both in knowedge and in will. Pelagianism, accordingly, banishes God from his world. It leads both to Deism and atheism and enthrones human arbitrariness and folly. Therefore, the solution of the problem must be sought in another direction. It must be sought in the fact that God—because he is God and the universe is his creation—by the infinitely majestic activity of his knowing and willing, does not destroy but instead creates and maintains the freedom and independence of his creatures” (Reformed Dogmatics, 2:376-77, emphasis mine). “The fact that things and events, including the sinful thoughts and deeds of men, have been eternally known and fixed in that counsel of God does not rob them of their own character but rather establishes and guarantees them all, each in its own kind and nature and in its own context and circumstances. Included in that counsel of God are sin and punishment, but also freedom and responsibility, sense of duty and conscience, and law and justice” (The Wonderful Works of God, 145).

Geerhardus Vos likewise understands God’s sovereign decree not to destroy or limit but to establish and ground man’s freedom.

“God’s decree grounds the certainty of His free knowledge and likewise the occurring of free actions. Not foreknowledge as such but the decree on which it rests makes free actions certain” (Reformed Dogmatics, 1:20). “…God can realize His decrees with reference to His creatures without needing to limit their freedom in a deterministic manner. Their free acts are not uncertain and the certainty to which these acts are connected is not brought about by God in a materialistic, pantheistic, or rationalistic manner. As the omnipresent and omnipotent One, the personal One, He can so govern man that man can do nothing without His will and permission and still do everything of himself in full freedom. When God sanctifies someone, He is at work in the depths of his being where the issues of life are, and then the sanctified will acts of itself and unconstrained outwardly no less freely than if it never had been under the working of God. The work of God does not destroy the freedom of the creature but is precisely its foundation” (Reformed Dogmatics, 1:90-91, emphasis mine).

Cornelius Van Til employs the archetype-ectype distinction and the Reformed covenantal structure to uphold both God’s freedom and man’s freedom in their proper relation.

“Our view of man as the spiritual production of God points to God as the archetype of all human freedom. Human freedom must be like God’s freedom, since man resembles God, and it must be different from God’s freedom since man is a finite creature. In God, then, lies the archetype of human freedom. … We are fashioned after God and our freedom after God’s freedom. But never ought we to lose sight of the fact that our freedom is distinguished from God’s freedom by reason of our finitude” (“Freedom,” 4). “We found … that the Reformed covenant theology remained nearest to this Biblical position. Other theories of the will go off on either of two byways, namely, that of seeking an unwarranted independence for man, or otherwise of subjecting man to philosophical necessitarianism. Reformed theology attempts to steer clear of both these dangers; avoiding all forms of Pelagianizing and of Pantheizing thought. It thinks to have found in the covenant relation of God with creation the true presentation of the Biblical concept of the relation of God to man. Man is totally dependent upon God and exists with all creation for God. Yet his freedom is not therewith abridged but realized” (“The Will in Its Theological Relations,” 77, emphasis mine).

For more on this listen to this episode of Christ the Center in which we dive deeper into this topic with a consideration of Van Til’s representational principle.

James Ussher (1581-1656) was one of the most influential Reformed theologians of the seventeenth century. He adroitly contended throughout his life against Roman Catholicism on various platforms, whether writing, preaching or debating. And even though he turned down an invitation to the Westminster Assembly for political reasons, he might well be considered the man who stands behind the Westminster Confession of Faith.

A Brief History

Ussher was born on January 4, 1580, in Dublin, Ireland to a distinguished family. His last name testified to this, as one relative was usher to King John. At the age of ten he was converted upon reading Romans 12:1, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service” (KJV). He would eventually succeed his uncle, Henry Ussher, as Archbishop of Armagh. From early on he had a special interest in history and chronology and would soon be known as the scholar who composed a biblical chronology and dated the creation at 4004 BC. This interest of his is especially evident in his work The Annals of the World. His formal education began at the age of thirteen when he was admitted to Trinity College in Dublin. He would remain there for his entire academic career. In 1607, he received his Bachelor of Divinity and was appointed Professor of Divinity at the university where he lectured for the next 14 years. In 1613, he was made Doctor of Divinity. In 1621, he was called to the bishopric of Meath and by 1625 he was made Archbishop of Armagh, primate of the Irish church. In 1601 he had taken up an eighteen-year study of the church fathers in order to commence his battle with the claims of the Roman Catholic Church, a battle that he would wage throughout his whole life.

Ussher contra Rome

Ussher’s family included both Protestants and Roman Catholics. His grandfather was Roman Catholic and his uncle would eventually turn to Rome as well. Later, when he was on a trip to England, his own mother became a communicant of Rome. Ussher made it a regular habit of visiting England, traveling there one summer out of every three for study and to grow his library, which some have numbered around ten thousand volumes! When he returned to Ireland, however, he tried to convince his mother to return to the Protestant fold, but she resisted. Ussher would go on to dedicate much of his life to the refutation of Rome’s dogma. Interestingly, the Act of Uniformity required Roman Catholics to attend the worship services that Ussher led and preached at every Sunday.

In 1613, he penned De Christianarum Ecclesiarum Successione et Statu, which “answered Rome’s query on the state of Protestantism before Luther.” In this work, he demonstrates that Christ has always had a visible church untainted by Rome’s corruptions. His most monumental piece would come in 1631, Historia de Gotteschalci, in which he sharply points out the difference between the Roman tradition and the Protestant tradition in early Ireland. He engages such topics of issue as Scripture, purgatory, grace, justification, sacraments, the mass, and the Pope’s authority. His theological acuity in this work has led some to say that it never received even a plausible answer from Rome. In 1660, his work Historia Dogmatica Controversiae … de Scriptures et Sacris Vernaculis was posthumously published. In this book he showed that the celebration of public worship in an unknown tongue (say, Latin, as the Roman Catholic church practiced at the time) was unknown from the early church up to the 7th century. He also makes the case that from early on the people of God were always exhorted to read Scripture for themselves. On top of writing, he was also a prolific speaker and debater. At the age of nineteen, he was chosen to debate with a Jesuit on the points of contention between Rome and Protestantism. The debate was organized with weekly engagements, but after the second round the Jesuit threw in the towel. Ussher, wanting to continue the debate, sent a letter in the spirit of David before Goliath:

“I Am Going Out of the World”

Ussher’s earthly service came to an end on March 21, 1656. Richard Parr preached before Ussher earlier in January of that same year. After the sermon, Ussher remarked,

For Further Study

• James Ussher, A Body of Divinity.
• Crawford Gribben, The Irish Puritans: James Ussher and the Reformation of the Church.
• Richard Snoddy, The Soteriology of James Ussher: The Act and Object of Saving Faith (Oxford Studies in Historical Theology).
• Jonathan D. Moore, “James Ussher’s Influence on the Synod of Dordt.” In Revisiting the Synod of Dordt (1618-1619), 163-179.
• You can read some of his sermons here.
• His works are also available for Logos Bible Software.

[1] Smith, Robert Worthington. “James Ussher: Biblical Chronicler.” Anglican Theological Review 41, no. 2 (April 1959): 84-94. [2] Clary, Ian Hugh. “The Irish Puritans: James Ussher and the Reformation of the Church.” American Theological Inquiry 3, no. 1 (January 15, 2010): 175-179.

Panel Members

• Jim Cassidy
• Jeff Waddington
• Camden Bucey

Participants: Camden Bucey, Jeff Waddington, Jim Cassidy