On Faith and Works

Contents

Reading pages: 1–16 · 17–30 · 31–47 · 48–49

1. 1Augustine states the view he will answer: that anyone, even one openly persisting in grave sin, should be baptized first and taught morals afterwards, and will be saved “as through fire.”
2. 2The occasion of the dispute: some wanted to baptize those remarried after divorce, whose unions Christ calls adultery, and extended this to all unrepentant sinners.
3. 3The mixture of good and bad in the church does not abolish discipline: Moses, Phinehas, and Paul all punished or excluded notorious sinners, though in love.
4. 4Christ tolerated Judas and foretold weeds among the wheat, yet he also commanded church discipline, including exclusion; both tolerance and correction have their place.
5. 5Error often comes from following one set of texts and ignoring the balancing ones, as in errors about the Trinity, marriage, and food.
6. 6Some, like the Donatists, press strictness so far as to break unity; others press patience so far as to abandon discipline and leave pastors unconcerned with conduct.
7. 7Sound teaching balances both: tolerate the wicked when discipline would harm peace, but exercise discipline when peace allows.
8. 8A married candidate who refused abstinence during the days of preparation would not be baptized; how then can an adulterer who refuses to amend be admitted?
9. 9Except at the point of death, the time before baptism is precisely when converts should be taught how to live; the catechumenate exists for this.
10. 10A woman who unknowingly marries another's husband becomes an adulteress only once she knows; ending such unions corrects sin rather than dissolving marriages, since in the church marriage is a sacrament.
11. 11The apostles' letters, written to the baptized, contain both faith and morals; putting faith first reflects that good life follows faith, not that morals should be taught only after baptism.
12. 12Peter's call at Pentecost included “Repent,” which means putting off the old life; repentance is fruitless for one who persists in adultery.
13. 13Peter's call to repent and to be rescued from a crooked generation required a change of life before baptism, not only faith.
14. 14The eunuch's short confession did not exclude further teaching: to “preach Jesus” includes both the whole creed and how believers must live.
15. 15Preaching “Christ crucified” includes the crucifixion of the old self and its desires, so it cannot permit professed adultery.
16. 16The two great commandments cannot be split between candidates and the baptized, since love of God and love of neighbor imply each other.
17. 17The Red Sea typology supports repentance before baptism: leaving Egypt signifies renouncing sin, and the law given after the crossing included both the worship of God and moral commands.
18. 18No one would baptize an idolater who refused to give up idolatry; for the same reason the sexually immoral who refuse to amend must not be baptized, since both are excluded from God's kingdom.
19. 19John the Baptist taught soldiers and tax collectors how to live before baptizing them, showing that moral instruction belongs to preparation for baptism.
20. 20Christ told the rich man to keep the commandments to enter life; faith and conduct are inseparable, so Scripture sometimes names one for both.
21. 21Paul's teaching that we are justified by faith without works of the law was misread as licence; true saving faith works through love, and the other apostles wrote against faith without works.
22. 222 Peter warns that some twisted Paul's hard sayings to neglect good living, and urges holy conduct in view of the new heavens and earth.
23. 23James compares faith without works to the demons' belief and calls it dead.
24. 24Augustine introduces 1 Cor 3:11–15, which his opponents read as promising salvation through purgatorial fire to believers who live wickedly.
25. 25If faith alone saved through fire, even persistent adulterers and prostitutes should be baptized, and the many texts excluding the wicked from God's kingdom and the judgment of Matthew 25 would be false.
26. 26Since the plain texts are true, 1 Cor 3:11–15 must be interpreted otherwise, as one of Paul's hard sayings.
27. 27Augustine's own interpretation: the foundation is faith working through love; gold and silver are wholehearted devotion to God, while wood and hay are carnal attachments to lawful goods, lost with painful “fire”; grave sin destroys the foundation itself.
28. 28Paul's permission to let an unbelieving spouse depart (1 Cor 7:15) applies when she demands that the Christian continue in crime; the pain of such separation is the “fire” by which he is saved.
29. 29Augustine's interpretation, whether the purifying pain is in this life or after it, avoids promising salvation to the unrepentant wicked.
30. 30The Canaanite woman was praised because Christ saw her changed; believing in Christ means faith working through love, not the dead faith of demons.
31. 31Refusing baptism to those who profess to persist in adultery is not uprooting the weeds early but refusing to sow them; such people themselves refuse to come to Christ.
32. 32Refusing baptism to an adulterer who will not change is not the lazy servant's fault; admitting him would teach that unrepentant adulterers inherit the kingdom, a “bad net” pastors must avoid.
33. 33Excluding the openly unrepentant from baptism is not new but the church's ancient custom for prostitutes and actors; where adulterers are carelessly admitted, the practice should be corrected, not extended.
34. 34Even those who treat only unchastity, idolatry, and murder as deadly must count adultery among them.
35. 35Augustine distinguishes manifest adultery, which bars from baptism, from doubtful cases: marriage to unbelievers, Herod's union, a faithful concubine, and a man who remarries after putting away an adulterous wife, where Scripture is obscure and error may be venial.
36. 36The right order is faith in the Trinity, repentance from dead works, and forgiveness in baptism, which forgives sin but does not permit it.
37. 37The absence of an explicit apostolic rule on remarried converts proves nothing; Peter's call to leave a crooked generation covers adultery, and John's demands on tax collectors show a fortiori that adultery cannot be allowed.
38. 38Israel's sin was not only unbelief but also the killing of Christ, a sin against good life; true faith avoids both.
39. 39The violent who seize the kingdom are those who by faith obtain the Spirit of love, fulfilling the law from love, not the wicked who merely believe.
40. 40Knowing God, which is eternal life, means keeping his commandments; God's commandment is to believe in Christ and love one another.
41. 41Faith profits by bringing help to live well and pardon for those who turn from sin; Wisdom 15:2 and 1 John 2:1–2 give no security to those who persist.
42. 42Rom 2:12 offers no milder fate: “judgment” in Scripture can mean eternal damnation, as John 5:28–29 divides the risen by their deeds.
43. 43“Judgment” cannot mean temporary purgation, since unbelievers too are “already judged”; those who sin knowingly under the law are worse off, not better.
44. 44Rom 2:12 concerns Gentiles and Jews, both needing Christ's grace, not good and bad Christians.
45. 452 Peter 2 says that those who know Christ and return to corruption are worse off than if they had never known him, refuting any milder fate for baptized sinners.
46. 46The “holy commandment” of 2 Peter is chaste living; Peter's dry springs, Jude's waterless clouds, and James's dead faith all describe believers who do not live accordingly.
47. 47Those who seek baptism while professing to keep their adulteries are worse than backsliders: they refuse to leave Sodom at all, and sinning knowingly aggravates guilt.
48. 48Life must accord with baptism; there are grave sins requiring excommunication, lesser ones healed by rebuke, and daily sins forgiven through the Lord's Prayer.
49. 49Conclusion: the wicked are tolerated without abandoning discipline; candidates must be taught how to live as well as what to believe; eternal life is not promised to dead faith, and those who openly intend to remain in adultery refuse Christ's gift.