Calvinism and Arminianism

SOVEREIGNTY, FREEWILL AND SALVATION
PROF. M. M. NINAN
of Man as it is today. Even the church has copied the structure and principle of authority
of the Kingdom of this world. This again was clearly explained by Jesus while he was with
his disciples.
Matthew 20: 25-28 But Jesus called them aside and said, “You know that the rulers of the
Gentiles lord it over them, and their superiors exercise authority over them. It shall not be
this way among you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your
servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave just as the Son of
Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”
The problem here is really this. How do we parent our children with love and with servant
heart. Jesus being God showed us how. We have turned them all upside down and have
been burning our children for disobedience. Our theology reflects just that.
The problem has always been clear within each family. Children have always rebelled in
growing up and asserting their independence and personality. Belligerence and
disobedience were part of this growing up. How did we dealt with that? Did we burn
them or did we redeem them with our love and even withour lives?
Here then is the resolution of the paradox.
The Arminianism maintains:
FREEDOM OF WILL
1. that freedom of will has not been destroyed by original sin, and
2. that this freedom remains unimpaired under the influence of Divine grace
Freedom is the power of the will to act or not to act, to act this or that way; whereas it is
the characteristic of necessary causes, as animals and inanimate beings, to produce their
effects by an intrinsic necessity.
Predestination was an early scientific misunderstanding of the law of mechanical cause
effect.
The mechanical philosophy is a natural philosophy describing the universe as similar to a
large-scale mechine. The concept of cause effect and that the world acts purely based on
the underlying laws of nature causes everything to be predictable. During period of
reformation and for a few centuries soon after, the philosophical outlook of man became
mechanical. TheMechanical philosophy is associated with the scientific revolution of Early
Modern Europe. One of the first expositions of universal mechanism is found in the opening
passages of Leviathan by Hobbes published in 1651.
147