Paradise Lost - Universitatea "Emanuel"

58
PERICHORESIS 2/2 (2004)
CORNELIU C. SIMUŢ
however, which is the proof of justification, is effectual, in other words we
must perform good works out of love and consequently be righteous in
everyday reality. 29
Walter Travers
Following Cartwright, Travers connects his doctrine of justification to God,
and especially to Christ, who is the only person capable of making
satisfaction for our sins. Thus, justification is described as satisfaction for
sins. Such a definition offers Travers the opportunity to talk about the
person of Christ.
In his Vindiciae Ecclesiae Anglicanae, Travers writes that our
justification does not depend on ourselves, but on Christ and on his works.
For Travers, Christ died in order to make propitiation for our sins, which
means that he died for our sins in our place. This exchange, which
resembles Luther’s commercium admirabile, is effectual to the entire
Church. Travers explains that God redeemed his Church due to the atoning
death of Christ. In fact, Christ died that we may have life, and so
redemption and, particularly, justification were made possible because
Christ was both God and man. This underscoring of Christ’s incarnation is
actually placing justification in God’s sphere of action. Justification was
possible because of God, who was actively involved in the work of
redemption. Travers here makes a daring equivalence by writing that the
blood of Christ was the blood of God, the very foundation of justification. At
this point, for Travers, justification means both to make satisfaction and to
effect reconciliation between man and God. Furthermore, Travers stresses
once more the utmost importance of God in justification. We are justified
because God was willing to forgive us and make peace with us. This is what
Travers wrote:
And if any should deny [it] to be proper to the person of Christ to make
propitiation for our sins, it may be proved by this that the Apostle Paul saith,
“that God redeemed the Church by his blood“; so calling it the blood of God,
wherewith the Church is redeemed, because in the same person of Jesus Christ
are both the nature of man, whose blood was shed, and the nature of God, which
made it of inestimable prize and value, to be effectual to redeem the Church. But
the blood of no other person can be called the blood of God, therefore no other
person can make satisfaction for sin and reconcile us unto God. 30
In his Supplication, written against Hooker’s A Learned Discourse of
Justification, Travers lists the main points of Hooker’s doctrine of
justification, which make up the core of his public criticism. Firstly, Hooker
reportedly told Travers when the latter urged him to seek the advice of
other Church leaders in matters pertaining to doctrine that, concerning the
doctrine of predestination, his best author was his own reason. 31 Secondly,
Travers wrote that Hooker preached that the assurance of what we believe