John Calvin-Life,Legacy and Theology

JOHN CALVIN : LIFE, LEGACY AND THEOLOGY -
PROF. M. M. NINAN
"The Orthodox concept of synergism, far from being a departure from Apostolic Faith, is attested to in
Scripture and repeated throughout the centuries. “It is for God to grant His grace,” said St. Cyril of
Jerusalem; “your task is to accept that grace and to guard it”. St. John Chrysostom exclaims, “All
depends indeed on God, but not so that our free-will is hindered. [God] does not anticipate our choice,
lest our free-will be outraged. But when we have chosen, then great is the assistance He brings to us.”
St. Augustine himself witnesses to a synergism between God and Man, as Thomas Oden explains:
“Though not the first, Augustine was the most brilliant exponent of how the action of grace can be both
‘from the will of man and from the mercy of God.’ Thus we accept the dictum, ‘It is not a matter of
human willing or running but of God’s showing mercy,’ as if it meant, ‘The will of man is not sufficient
by itself unless there is also the mercy of God.’ But by the same token the mercy of God is not
sufficient by itself unless there is also the will of man.” Commenting on Romans 9:16, St. Augustine
states that “If any man is of the age to use his reason, he cannot believe, hope, love, unless he will to
do so, nor obtain the prize of the high calling of God unless he voluntarily run for it.” Finally, Oden
notes “That the synergy of grace and freedom became the consensual teaching of the believing
church is clear from the Third Ecumenical Council, held in Ephesus in A.D. 431: ‘For He acts in us that
we may both will and do what He wishes, nor does He allow those gifts to be idle in us which He has
given to be used and not to be neglected, that we also may be cooperators with the grace of God’”.
"The Orthodox doctrine of synergy came to its fullest and most refined articulation with the Sixth
Œcumenical Synod (680-681). This Synod declared that Christ has both a divine and a human will,
and that these two wills co-operated synergistically. This has tremendous ramifications for Christian
anthropology. Those who have been organically united to Christ in Holy Baptism (Gal. 3:27) have the
Spirit of God living in them; and this Spirit quickens our soul and makes it alive unto God. Our own will
then freely co-operates with this newly given Divine Energy which is ever renewed in us through
ascetic struggle and participation in the Mystery of His Body and Blood. Thus, the Œcumenical
Synods that defined and refined the doctrine of the Person of Christ set forth that, for us who are
made in His image, it is not only God’s will that is operative in us , nor is it our own will working apart
from God (this would be Pelagianism), but rather it is the two working together in harmony, neither
overwhelming the other (cf. Phil. 2:13-14).” Carmen Fragapane, Salvation by Christ
The image of God has been defaced. Did Adam has transmitted his actual sinfulness, i.e. his guilt, to
posterity? The answer is that is is in as much as the DNA transmission with a tendency to do evil - but
nothing that cannot be surmounted by the freedom. The Greek fathers, with their insistence that
man’s free will remains intact and that is the root of actual sinning, but it not something that cannot be
reversed just because of that freewill. The use of the freewill to choose to disobey has only
strengthened the DNA of freewill in the posterity in spite of the sinful tendencies.
There is hardly a hint in the Greek fathers that mankind as a whole shares in Adam’s guilt, i.e. his
culpability. This partly explains their reluctance to speak of his legacy to us as sin. But they have the
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