Dave Hunt on Augustine,the father of Calvinism: Those errors include infant baptism for regeneration (infants who die unbaptized are damned), the necessity of baptism for the remission of sins (martyrdom does the same), purgatory, salvation in the Church alone through its sacraments and persecution of those who reject Catholic dogmas. Augustine also fathered acceptance of the Apocrypha (which he admitted even the Jews rejected), allegorical interpretation of the Bible (thus the creation account, the six days,etc. inGenesis are not necessarily literal), and rejection of the literal personal reign of Christ on earth for a thousand years (we are now in the millennial reign of Christ with the Church reigning and the devil presently bound). Augustine insists that Satan is now bound on the basis that even now men are, and doubtless to the end of the world shall be, converted to the faith from the unbelief in which he [Satan] held them. That he views this promised binding of Satan in the bottomless pit (Revelation 20:1-3) allegorically is clear. Amazingly, Satan is bound in each instance in which he is spoiled of one of his goods [i.e., someone believes in Christ]. And even more amazing, the abyss in which he is shut up is somehow construed by Augustine to be in the depths of Christ-rejectors blind hearts. It is thus that Satan is continually shut up as in an abyss. 0 Augustine doesnt attempt to explain how he arrived at such an astonishing idea, much less how one abyss could exist in millions of hearts or how, being bound there, Satan would not be free to blind those within whose hearts he is supposedly bound (2 Corinthians 4:4). Nor does he explain how or why in spite of Satan being bound, Christ commissioned Paul to turn Jew and Gentile from the power of Satan unto God (Acts 26:18), Paul could deliver the Corinthian fornicator to Satan (1 Corinthians 5:5), Satan can transform himself into an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14), Paul would warn the Ephesian believers not to give place to the devil (Ephesians 4:27) and urge them and us today to stand against the wiles of the devil (6:11), Satan could still be going about like a roaring lion ... seeking whom he may devour ( l Peter 5:8) and able to continually accuse Christians before God and with his angels to wage war in heaven against Michael and his angels and at last be cast out of heaven to earth (Revelation 12:7-10), etc.. Augustine was one of the first to place the authority of tradition on a level with the Bible and to incorporate much philosophy, especially Platonism, into his theology.
Posted on: Thu, 18 Dec 2014 19:03:21 +0000
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