All Infants according to Calvin are saved

[civic]

Calvin’s Institutes, where Calvin condemned Servetus. He said that Servetus’ theology was so twisted that it stressed free will to the point that if you followed him, you would be forced to conclude that even infants who died were damned to hell because they were not able to exercise their will to believe in saving faith (Institutes IV, 16, p 31). In that same section, Calvin addresses John 3:36, and argues that it points to infant salvation, as infants were not able to exercise willing unbelief, so they do could not possibly stand condemned.

Calvin often taught on this issue, and in one instance he even preached a sermon (on Isaiah 14:21) where he explained that reprobation (pre-destination for hell) was true of infants, but that God would allow all of them to grow to a condition of sinful accountability so that they could secure their own damnation (here is a long but fascinating paper which takes an in-depth look at all Calvin taught on this subject).

After Calvin and Luther died, their followers went in different directions on this issue. Calvinists stressed the salvation of infants, while Lutherans (and later Methodists) went on to claim the salvation of baptized infants, while remaining largely silent on the fate of others. The Westminster Catechism seems to track with the Calvinists, by arguing that infants who die are in glory (ch. 10, sec. 3 says those “dying in infancy are regenerated and saved by Christ”).

Loraine Boettner explained why the doctrine of infant salvation must be uniquely Calvinistic:

“The doctrine of infant salvation finds a logical place in the Calvinistic system; for the redemption of the soul is thus infallibly determined irrespective of any faith, repentance, or good works, whether actual or foreseen. It does not, however, find a logical place in Arminianism or any other system. Furthermore, it would seem that a system such as Arminianism, which suspends salvation on a personal act of rational choice, would logically demand that those dying in infancy must either be given another period of probation after death, in order that their destiny may be fixed, or that they must be annihilated.” (Unconditional Election, 145).

BB Warfield had earlier written something similar:

“Their destiny is determined irrespective of their choice, by an unconditional decree of God, suspended for its execution on no act of their own; and their salvation is wrought by an unconditional application of the grace of Christ to their souls, through the immediate and irresistible operation of the Holy Spirit prior to and apart from any action of their own proper wills . . . And if death in infancy does depend on God’s providence, it is assuredly God in His providence who selects this vast multitude to be made participants of His unconditional salvation . . . This is but to say that they are unconditionally predestinated to salvation from the foundation of the world” (Two Studies on the History of Doctrine, 230).

Charles Hodge agreed. He wrote, “All who die in infancy are doubtless saved, but they are saved by grace” (Systematic Theology, ii, 11).https://thecripplegate.com/theologians-on-infant-salvation/

hope this helps !!!

 

[civic]

So Calvinists don’t really believe the “P” in tulip.

Since all infants are saved then at some point most every infant loses their salvation. Just another contradiction within Calvinism.

 

[The Rogue Tomato]

There is no scripture of which I am aware that says infants who die are saved. But I like to think that it's true. There is one scripture that comes close.

Isaiah 57:1 The righteous perish,
and no one takes it to heart;
the devout are taken away,
and no one understands
that the righteous are taken away
to be spared from evil.
2 Those who walk uprightly
enter into peace;
they find rest as they lie in death.

The above is talking about adults, not infants, but one can imagine that God treats things like abortion or infant death in the same way.

 

[Ezra]

infants you children adults who cant comprehend mentality are covered by grace. what happens if a lost person has a accident becomes incapacitated not able to function on there own... i dunno

might i also add the Calvinist i have dealt with. will not tell you infants go to heaven

 

[TedT]

Charles Hodge agreed. He wrote, “All who die in infancy are doubtless saved, but they are saved by grace” (Systematic Theology, ii, 11).https://thecripplegate.com/theologians-on-infant-salvation/

Well, I wonder: if infant death is a sure fire method of saving people then why does HE not just kill everyone off as infants?

Is this suggestion so impossible??

Why was I not killed and saved as an infant??

We know HE wants no one to die in hell so why let some live into adulthood and then die without faith? This is just another contradictory pov to make our theology fit human desires and definitions...

Death proves sinfulness.
Elect good seed infants will be saved from their sin.
Non-elect reprobate weed infants will go to Sheol to wait for the final judgement, Ps 9:17.
There is no magic in your age at your death but only your relationship with YHWH at the time of your death.

 

[civic]

Well, I wonder: if infant death is a sure fire method of saving people then why does HE not just kill everyone off as infants?

Is this suggestion so impossible??

Why was I not killed and saved as an infant??

We know HE wants no one to die in hell so why let some live into adulthood and then die without faith? This is just another contradictory pov to make our theology fit human desires and definitions...

Death proves sinfulness.
Elect good seed infants will be saved from their sin.
Non-elect reprobate weed infants will go to Sheol to wait for the final judgement, Ps 9:17.
There is no magic in your age at your death but only your relationship with YHWH at the time of your death.

The irony here is according to Calvin snd his followers in the OP they start out by default in a saved state which opposes total depravity and being born a sinner with original sin.

The contradictions are piling up with their systematic.

 

[The Rogue Tomato]

The irony here is according to Calvin snd his followers in the OP they start out by default in a saved state which opposes total depravity and being born a sinner with original sin.

I've never heard any reformer say that or anything like that. The only thing like that I heard was in a (free-will believing) Baptist church arguing something about the age of accountability, where sin doesn't count until you're a certain age. Struck me as weird as all get out and I was a free-willer back then.

 

[TedT]

sin doesn't count until you're a certain age.

Death is the wages for sin, not a consequence of life...therefore death proves sinfulness.

 

[praise_yeshua]

There is no scripture of which I am aware that says infants who die are saved. But I like to think that it's true. There is one scripture that comes close.

Isaiah 57:1 The righteous perish,
and no one takes it to heart;
the devout are taken away,
and no one understands
that the righteous are taken away
to be spared from evil.
2 Those who walk uprightly
enter into peace;
they find rest as they lie in death.

The above is talking about adults, not infants, but one can imagine that God treats things like abortion or infant death in the same way.

If God predetermined damnation regardless of culpability... Which is what Calvinism teaches, then why are you so afraid to include those you believe to be innocent.

I tell you why. You have the same natural empathy that even Calvin had. As it has been repeatedly referenced... Calvin struggled with his own beliefs. Most all Calvinists do. He was too arrogant to admit he was wrong. So he fabricated nonsense that you can't accept yourself.

If you have empathy for children.... Then there is no means for you to deny it all your fellowmen.

Stop. Think. It is why Jesus said that with what measure you judge another, you will be judged. At all times Empathy is demanded from all by God. It is the one of the Essences of the Atonement.

 

[praise_yeshua]

Death is the wages for sin, not a consequence of life...therefore death proves sinfulness.

No. Death proves the judgement of sin. Even the innocent die.

 

[TedT]

the innocent die.

Ezek 18:20 The soul who sins is the one who will die.
26 If a righteous man turns from his righteousness and practices iniquity, he will die for this. He will die because of the iniquity he has committed. Berean Standard Bible
If you believe that we are conceived in sin, separated from GOD in Adam, then when was a man ever righteous?? This hints at our pre-conception righteousness and then our first free will decision to sin, eh?

Deuteronomy 24:16 every man shall be put to death for his own sin.

If you think that infants in the womb are too newly created, too tabula rasa to sin then let's have a look at Gen 25:21-23 together, ok?

For someone who demands evidence so quickly, I'm surprised that you didn't provide what you think to be the evidence for you assertion that the innocent die.

 

[TedT]

No. Death proves the judgement of sin.

I just noticed... how can anyone be under the judgment for sin without being a sinner, ie, without ever having sinned? Surely the only way to come under the judgment for sin is to sin and become a sinner?

NO holy and elect angel ever dies, only the fallen ones, right?

 

[civic]

Ezek 18:20 The soul who sins is the one who will die.
26 If a righteous man turns from his righteousness and practices iniquity, he will die for this. He will die because of the iniquity he has committed. Berean Standard Bible
If you believe that we are conceived in sin, separated from GOD in Adam, then when was a man ever righteous?? This hints at our pre-conception righteousness and then our first free will decision to sin, eh?

Deuteronomy 24:16 every man shall be put to death for his own sin.

If you think that infants in the womb are too newly created, too tabula rasa to sin then let's have a look at Gen 25:21-23 together, ok?

For someone who demands evidence so quickly, I'm surprised that you didn't provide what you think to be the evidence for you assertion that the innocent die.

The problem is Calvinism teaches all babies are sinful and born with a sin nature, all are born sinners and totally depraved and dead in their sins.

So its double speak, an oxymoron to say all babies are saved.

 

[praise_yeshua]

I just noticed... how can anyone be under the judgment for sin without being a sinner, ie, without ever having sinned? Surely the only way to come under the judgment for sin is to sin and become a sinner?

NO holy and elect angel ever dies, only the fallen ones, right?

Rom 5:14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam
Rom 5:15 But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead

There is no direct similarities of sin in the descendents of Adam. It was ADAM's sin that caused death upon those made in the similitude of Adam.

The descendents of Adam have an inclination to sin..... However, Adam had an inclination to sin. Adam was peccable from the beginning. He chose Eve over God. Adam loved Eve.

 

[TedT]

It was ADAM's sin that caused death upon those made in the similitude of Adam.

OR: we were sown into Adam, not to get his sin which is just to contrary to other scriptures but to be brought into his death as it says Rom 5:12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, so also death was passed on to all men ...death was passed on to all men, not his sin, so that Christ need only die once for all elect sinners, and not once for each of them.

I know that Adam's sin being passed onto all men is the peg from which so many other doctrines and whole theologies hang and to lose it leaves them in a heap on the ground, it really doesn't say his sin was passed onto us, only his death.

 

[praise_yeshua]

OR: we were sown into Adam, not to get his sin which is just to contrary to other scriptures but to be brought into his death as it says Rom 5:12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, so also death was passed on to all men ...death was passed on to all men, not his sin, so that Christ need only die once for all elect sinners, and not once for each of them.

I know that Adam's sin being passed onto all men is the peg from which so many other doctrines and whole theologies hang and to lose it leaves them in a heap on the ground, it really doesn't say his sin was passed onto us, only his death.

I can accept most of that.....

 

[TedT]

I can accept most of that.....

Thank you but, you probably haven't processed the implications yet as people are still conceived in sin but not from Adam so where did their sin come from if they were being created at conception?

Ergo, we lived and sinned as spirits pre-earthy conception,

 

[synergy]

Thank you but, you probably haven't processed the implications yet as people are still conceived in sin but not from Adam so where did their sin come from if they were being created at conception?

Ergo, we lived and sinned as spirits pre-earthy conception,

Don't tell me you believe in the preexistence of souls. That was Origen's idea. It was condemned afterwards by the Church but it resurfaced with Morman Joseph Smith.

 

[Ezra]

Thank you but, you probably haven't processed the implications yet as people are still conceived in sin but not from Adam so where did their sin come from if they were being created at conception?

Ergo, we lived and sinned as spirits pre-earthy conception,

we are born with a sinful nature inherited from the fall in the garden . which has been passed down. adam and eve sinned it the went to cain who slew able . from that point it went from one generation to the other . it still grows today

 

[TibiasDad]

Calvin’s Institutes, where Calvin condemned Servetus. He said that Servetus’ theology was so twisted that it stressed free will to the point that if you followed him, you would be forced to conclude that even infants who died were damned to hell because they were not able to exercise their will to believe in saving faith (Institutes IV, 16, p 31). In that same section, Calvin addresses John 3:36, and argues that it points to infant salvation, as infants were not able to exercise willing unbelief, so they do could not possibly stand condemned.

Calvin often taught on this issue, and in one instance he even preached a sermon (on Isaiah 14:21) where he explained that reprobation (pre-destination for hell) was true of infants, but that God would allow all of them to grow to a condition of sinful accountability so that they could secure their own damnation (here is a long but fascinating paper which takes an in-depth look at all Calvin taught on this subject).

After Calvin and Luther died, their followers went in different directions on this issue. Calvinists stressed the salvation of infants, while Lutherans (and later Methodists) went on to claim the salvation of baptized infants, while remaining largely silent on the fate of others. The Westminster Catechism seems to track with the Calvinists, by arguing that infants who die are in glory (ch. 10, sec. 3 says those “dying in infancy are regenerated and saved by Christ”).

Loraine Boettner explained why the doctrine of infant salvation must be uniquely Calvinistic:


BB Warfield had earlier written something similar:


Charles Hodge agreed. He wrote, “All who die in infancy are doubtless saved, but they are saved by grace” (Systematic Theology, ii, 11).https://thecripplegate.com/theologians-on-infant-salvation/

hope this helps !!!

This completely undermines the idea of predestination, for if one is predetermined to reprobation in eternity past, then they cannot die as an infant and be saved. Thus, all infants who die are either not predetermined or only predetermined elect children die, or Predetermination is made after a certain age; all of which discredit Calvin’s teaching.


Doug