A53686:1007
The Doctrine of Justification by Faith
The doctrine of justification by faith through the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, explained, confirmed, & vindicated by John Owen ...
London: printed for R. Boulter, 1677
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
That which he doth here assert, was such a known, such a fundamental principle of Truth among all Believers, that their conviction and knowledge of it, was the ground and occasion of their transition, and passing over from Judaism unto the Gospel and Faith in Jesus Christ thereby.
And in the words the Apostle determines that great inquiry, how, or by what means a Man is, or may be justified before God. The subject spoken of is expressed indefinitely; A Man, that is, any Man, a Jew, or a Gentile, a Believer, or an Unbeliever. The Apostle that spake, and they to whom he spake; the Galatians to whom he wrote, who also for ⟨p. 514⟩some time had believed and made Profession of the Gospel.
And in the words the Apostle determines that great inquiry, how, or by what means a Man is, or may be justified before God. The subject spoken of is expressed indefinitely; A Man, that is, any Man, a Jew, or a Gentile, a Believer, or an Ʋnbeliever. The Apostle that spake, and they to whom he spake; the Galatians to whom he wrote, who also for ⟨p. 514⟩some time had believed and made Profession of the Gospel.
The answer given unto the question, is both Negative and Positive, both asserted with the highest assurance, and as the common faith of all Christians, but only those who had been carried aside from it by Seducers. He asserts, that this is not, this cannot be by the Works of the Law. What is intended by the Law in these disputations of the Apostle, hath been before declared and evinced. The Law of Moses is sometimes signally intended; not absolutely, but as it was the present instance of Mens cleaving unto the Law of Righteousness, and not submitting themselves thereon unto the Righteousness of God. But that the consideration of the Moral Law, and the duties of it, is in this Argument any where excepted by him, is a weak imagination; yea, it would except the Ceremonial Law it self; for the observation of it, whilst it was in force, was a duty of the Moral Law.