Semi-Pelagianism
Can the soul take the first step toward God on its own? A later age said no
Semi-Pelagianism is the teaching that the human will can make the first move toward God, with divine grace then assisting what the person has begun. It is associated with figures such as John Cassian, though the label itself is a later, somewhat polemical coinage. The Second Council of Orange in 529 condemned this view in the West, affirming that grace must precede and enable even the beginning of faith.
How it traveled
- A Treatise on the Predestination of the SaintsHippo Regius · c. 430 CEexplains
- A Treatise Against Two Letters of the PelagiansHippo Regius · c. 430 CEchallenges
- Discussion: Third PartWittenberg · c. 1546 CEchallenges
Key passages(20)
Each passage is tagged by what it does with the idea: explains it, applies it in practice, redefines it with a new meaning, or challenges it. Relevance shows how directly the passage is about this idea.
A Treatise on the Predestination of the Saints · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 2.—To What Extent the Massilians [The party which Augustin is here opposing had its chief centre in Marseilles, and hence is called “Massilians.” Prosper in his letter called them reliquiæ Pe
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Discussion: Third Part · Martin Luther
Sect. CXLIX. — IT has happened to these assertors of “Free-will” according to the old proverb, ‘Striving dire Scylla’s rock to shun, they ’gainst Charybdis headlong run.’ For devotedly striving to dis
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A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 18.—The Desire of Good is God’s Gift. For they have thought that it was to be objected to us that we say “that God inspires into unwilling and resisting man the desire,” not of any very great
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A Treatise on the Predestination of the Saints · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 22.—God’s Promise is Sure. “But,” say they, “when it is said, ‘If thou believest, thou shalt be saved,’ one of these things is required; the other is offered. What is required is in man’s pow
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Book Second. of the Knowledge of God the Redeemer, in Christ, as First Manifested to the Fathers, Under the Law, and Thereafter to Us Under the Gospel · John Calvin
EVERY THING PROCEEDING FROM THE CORRUPT NATURE OF MAN DAMNABLE. The principal matters in this chapter are—I. A recapitulation of the former chapter, proving, from passages of Scriptures that the inte
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Book Second. of the Knowledge of God the Redeemer, in Christ, as First Manifested to the Fathers, Under the Law, and Thereafter to Us Under the Gospel · John Calvin
11. As to perseverance, it would undoubtedly have been regarded as the gratuitous gift of God, had not the very pernicious error prevailed, that it is bestowed in proportion to human merit, according
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Book Third. the Mode of Obtaining the Grace of Christ. the Benefits It Confers, and the Effects Resulting from It · John Calvin
THE BOASTED MERIT OF WORKS SUBVERSIVE BOTH OF THE GLORY OF GOD, IN BESTOWING RIGHTEOUSNESS, AND OF THE CERTAINTY OF SALVATION. The divisions of this chapter are,—I. To the doctrine of free justificat
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The Conferences of John Cassian. Part II. Containing Conferences XI-XVII · John Cassian
On the Semi-Pelagianism of this Conference and the erroneous passages from it extracted by Prosper, see the Introduction, p. 190, sq. Introduction. When after a short sleep we returned for morning s
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Book Second. of the Knowledge of God the Redeemer, in Christ, as First Manifested to the Fathers, Under the Law, and Thereafter to Us Under the Gospel · John Calvin
10. This movement of the will is not of that description which was for many ages taught and believed—viz. a movement which thereafter leaves us the choice to obey or resist it, but one which affects u
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Book Third. the Mode of Obtaining the Grace of Christ. the Benefits It Confers, and the Effects Resulting from It · John Calvin
11. We must strongly insist on these two things: That no believer ever performed one work which, if tested by the strict judgment of God, could escape condemnation; and, moreover, that were this grant
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Discussion: Third Part · Martin Luther
Sect. CLVII. — THE same John, introduces the Baptist speaking thus of Christ, “And of His fullness have all we received, and grace for grace.” (John i. 16). He says, that grace is received by us out
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Book Second. of the Knowledge of God the Redeemer, in Christ, as First Manifested to the Fathers, Under the Law, and Thereafter to Us Under the Gospel · John Calvin
13. Let us now hear Augustine in his own words, lest the Pelagians of our age, I mean the sophists of the Sorbonne, charge us after their wont with being opposed to all antiquity. In this indeed they
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A Treatise on Rebuke and Grace · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 9 [VI]—Why They May Justly Be Rebuked Who Do Not Obey God, Although They Have Not Yet Received the Grace of Obedience. “The apostle says,” say they, “‘For who maketh thee to differ? And what
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a careful and strict inquiry into the prevailing notions of the freedom of will · Jonathan Edwards
Concerning the Notion of Liberty of Will, consisting in Indifference. What has been said in the foregone section, has a tendency in some measure to evince the absurdity of the opinion of such as plac
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A Work on the Proceedings of Pelagius · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 55.—Pelagius’ Letter Discussed. What, then, is the meaning of those vaunting words of theirs in this epistle, wherein they boast of having induced the fourteen bishops who sat in that trial t
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Letters of St. Augustin · Augustine of Hippo
Letter CLXXXVIII. (a.d. 416.) To the Lady Juliana, Worthy to Be Honoured in Christ with the Service Due to Her Rank, Our Daughter Deservedly Distinguished, Alypius and Augustin Send Greeting in the
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The Letters of St. Jerome · Jerome
Ps. xvii. 4, LXX. Matt. vii. 13. Matt. v. 44. 8. It is a common argument with your party to say that God’s commandments are either possible or impossible. So far as they are the former you admit th
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Letter CCXXVI. Placed in 375. To the ascetics under him. It may be that the holy God will grant me the joy of a meeting with you, for I am ever longing to see you and hear about you, because in no
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Discussion: First Part · Martin Luther
Sect. XLIV. — UPON the authority of Erasmus, then, “Free-will,” is a power of the human will, which can, of itself, will and not will to embrace the word and work of God, by which it is to be led to t
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A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians · Augustine of Hippo
Chapter 25 [IX.]—He Shows that the Opinion of the Catholics is the Mean Between that of the Manicheans and Pelagians, and Refutes Both. But since, in these five particulars which I have set forth, in
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