J. TODD BILLINGS
For about a decade, John Milbank has been developing a trinitarian theol-
ogy of grace using the language of “gift” and “gift-giving”. In the first part
of this essay, I examine a series of his early articles which articulate his gift
theology, as well as his account of opposing viewpoints.2 In these early
works, the Reformed tradition as such is never referred to, but Reformation
thinking in general is an invisible opponent which exemplifies a “donative”
or “unilateral” view of grace. Milbank criticizes doctrines in which grace is
“passively” received, along with its corollary in Anders Nygren’s “unilat-
eral” portrait of agape.3 After presenting Milbank’s early gift theology, I give
a possible response in terms of Calvin’s theology of grace.
The second part of this essay continues the same task with Milbank’s more
recent book, Being Reconciled, published as the first in a series of books where
Milbank’s “gift-giving” paradigm will be used to examine the major loci of
theology.4 In this work, Calvin, Luther, and “Reformation” theologies are
moved from the shadows to the sideline, as Milbank makes generally nega-
tive comments about how “Reformation” theology cannot provide an
adequate theology of active reception. As I continue comparing Calvin’s
theology of grace with Milbank’s theology of the gift, I hope to show how
Calvin’s theology is quite resilient in the face of Milbank’s criticisms of
“Reformation” theologies in which grace supposedly functions as a “unilat-
eral” gift “passively” received. Calvin’s theology of grace blends elements
of divine initiative with participatory mutuality, developed through a trini-
J. Todd Billings,
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88 J. Todd Billings
In his more recent work, Milbank extends and develops the ideas of these
early essays, explicitly criticizing Reformation theologies as theologies of the
“unilateral” gift. Milbank offers his central exposition in Being Reconciled,42
which presents a number of concrete theological-social proposals. He
extends the account of Christology which he gave in The Word Made Strange,
speaks of his program of Christian Socialism, and defends a privation theory
of evil. What holds these essays together? The language of “gift” serves as
one unifying strand, but even more so than in his previous works on the
“gift”, Milbank makes repeated reference to the notion of “participation”.
What is a theology of “participation”? The word is a surprisingly flexible
one in theological discussions, and it is not always clear in what senses
Milbank uses the term. On one level, Milbank seems to be appropriating the
notion of “participation as deification”; this doctrine is taught by various
patristic and medieval writers, and was recently re-attributed to Augustine,
contra Harnack.43 However, there are many different types of doctrines of
“deification”.44 Thus, the fact that Milbank includes deification in his account
of “participation” is not in itself a significant clarification.
In assessing the different possible senses of “participation”, it is worth
noting that theologies of “participation” have a history in Milbank’s Angli-
can heritage. On the one hand, “participation” has been used as shorthand
for a relatively loose set of Platonic metaphysical claims affirming some
sense of ontological “participation” of creation in the creator. Anglican the-
ologians as far back as Richard Hooker have used the language of “partici-
pation” in this way, later given prominence by the Cambridge Platonists.45
In the nineteenth century, these early Anglican traditions are drawn upon by
John Henry Newman in his Anglican years, who again revives the language
of participation.46 With Newman in particular, the language of participation
has implications for the theology of grace, offering a via media between
Catholics and Protestants. In Newman’s hands, a theology of participation
favors the Catholic side of the divide. His work on justification was funda-
mentally suspicious of Protestant claims about justification by faith alone.
For Newman and other Tractarians, such a “dry” doctrine of justification
(extra nos) has lost the participatory sense of faith as formed by love. Justifi-
cation and sanctification should be seen as inseparable, a single act.
In Being Reconciled, Milbank seems to follow Newman in his impatience
with a Reformed account of grace and his preference for language of “par-
ticipation”. Milbank, like Newman, rejects “all Protestant accounts of grace”
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94 J. Todd Billings
that affirm “mere imputation”, because “an account of the arrival of grace
must for me also mean an account of sanctification and ethics”.47 Further-
more, a theology of participation lacks the “negative” anthropology of
Protestants who set nature against grace, thereby disrupting the Platonic par-
ticipation of the creature in the divine. For Milbank, an essential point of the-
ological anthropology is that humans are created for union with God, and
he finds the doctrines of sin and human incapacity as framed by Reforma-
tion theology—particularly with their emphasis upon the bondage of the
will—threatening to this emphasis.
Juxtaposing Calvin’s viewpoint with this distinctively [high] Anglican the-
ological language about “participation” is a peculiar task. On the one hand,
it might seem as though Calvin could provide precisely the sort of theology
that Newman and Milbank are looking for: a theology of grace that is never
“mere imputation”, but in which justification and sanctification are held
together tightly in one act of grace, united in the person of Christ. Just as
Milbank cannot account for the reception of grace without speaking of sanc-
tification, neither can Calvin—as my earlier discussion of Calvin on the
duplex gratia indicated.
Yet, Milbank’s view involves a deeper objection to Calvin’s theology of
grace. According to Milbank, Calvin and others who deny the freedom of
the will before regeneration have a negative anthropology, emphasizing sin
in such a way that the created human nature must be destroyed rather than
fulfilled in the “new creation” of regeneration. In a particular section of Being
Reconciled, Milbank gives a sympathetic account of Augustine on the
freedom of the will, despite the widespread caricature of Augustine as
opposing nature to grace in his account of the will.48 Yet Milbank simulta-
neously argues against Reformation and post-Reformation “misreadings” of
Augustine, which appear to oppose grace to free will, and ultimately, grace
to nature.49 I am afraid that Milbank has corrected one caricature (that of
Augustine) to replace it with another (that of Reformation theologies).
Calvin’s view of the “bondage of will” is frequently misunderstood. The
central reason for this is inattention to his work that directly addresses the
Roman Catholic concerns about his “negative” view of humanity in redemp-
tion, Bondage and Liberation of the Will. It is also a work with great insight into
Calvin’s interpretation of Augustine and other church fathers, with more
patristic citations than any other work besides the Institutes. In Bondage and
Liberation of the Will, Calvin responds to the criticisms that his Roman
Catholic adversary, Albert Pighius, brings against the 1539 edition of the
Institutes. One of Pighius’s central concerns was how human nature seemed
to be diminished rather than fulfilled in the action of grace, giving an insuf-
ficient account of the human side of redemption. Pighius was particularly
disturbed when Calvin wrote: “whatever is of our own will is effaced [in
regeneration]”. While this passage is later qualified by Calvin in the Insti-
tutes,50 his response in Bondage and Freedom of the Will is insightful. “By ‘what-
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Milbank’s Theology of “Gift” and Calvin’s Theology of Grace 95
ever is ours’ I understand that which belongs to us. Moreover, I define this
as what we have in ourselves apart from God’s creation.”51 What Calvin is
trying to preserve is the Pauline language of the conflicted human will
(Romans 7), torn between the “old self” (which should be “crucified”) and
the “new creation” in Christ. Our own will—our fallen will—must be effaced
and even crucified in regeneration. But this must not be confused with the
original good will given to Adam in creation, for Adam was “united” to God
before the fall.52
In Bondage and Liberation of the Will, Calvin uses Aristotelian distinctions to
express this relationship.53 The substance of human nature was created good,
oriented toward union with God. Indeed, as Calvin notes elsewhere, this
original creation enjoyed a “participation in God”.54 Through the fall, human-
ity developed the accidental characteristic of sinning, which brings alienation
from God. This “sinful human nature”, then, is only “human nature” in a sec-
ondary sense, for the substance of human nature is good.55 In regeneration,
the substance of human nature is led toward fulfillment in Christ through the
Spirit. Grace does not destroy this primal human nature, but fulfills it. In
terms of the will, the original, created orientation of the will is fulfilled in
redemption. It is in this context that Calvin claims that human freedom must
be contingent upon the work of the Spirit, affirming with John’s Gospel that
“without me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). For it is only through union
with Christ by the Spirit that the alienation which destroys human freedom
can be overcome. Thus, the work of God’s original creation is fulfilled in the
believer through the free will empowered by the Spirit.56
Yet, one may object, even if Calvin’s view of the will does not entail a neg-
ative view of created nature in relation to grace, is the human left with any-
thing beyond a “passive” role in sanctification? Milbank continues to press
his case against “passivity” in Being Reconciled, frequently associating it with
Reformation theologies in which grace and pardon have a “unilateral” char-
acter rather than one of “exchange”. On the question of “passivity” in Calvin,
Milbank would be correct about the “first grace” of justification if justifica-
tion occurred in isolation; but according to Calvin, it is impossible to isolate
the first grace from the second—justification is distinguishable but insepara-
ble from regeneration. Even a brief look at the pastoral aspects of Calvin’s
theology confirms that the human is not “passive” in receiving this duplex
gratia. For example, in his lengthy chapter on prayer in the Institutes, Calvin
makes a number of paradoxical claims. Initially, he asserts that humans
cannot pray rightly on their own.57 Right prayer involves reverence, thanks-
giving, yielding confidence in oneself, and praying with hope.58 Never-
theless, even though prayer is God’s work—both in enabling and
responding—it is a profoundly human work as well.59 In the opening pages
of the chapter, Calvin draws repeatedly upon Romans 8, giving a trinitarian
account of the Christian experience of prayer: the Spirit enables persons to
“confidently cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ ” as the Spirit also shows us Christ, through
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96 J. Todd Billings
whom God is revealed.60 Yet Calvin insists that we should not take this
emphasis upon the Spirit’s enabling us as license for laziness. We should not
be passive in the sense that we “give over the function of prayer to the Spirit
of God, and vegetate in that carelessness to which we are all too prone”.61
Believing that the Spirit helps Christians to prayer should “by no means”
lead one to “hold back our own effort”.62
Thus, through the Spirit, the Christian is empowered for growth in real
holiness (with real effort) in the practice of prayer. Yet, Calvin is always quick
to add, the “credit” and “honor” for this improvement—for these good
works—goes completely to God. Is this a negative, “passive” anthropology,
as Milbank claims? I do not believe so. Rather than a negative anthropology,
it is a christologically-conditioned anthropology, wherein it is only through
the empowering, activating presence of God that a human can do a work
that is “good”. As with the incarnation, humanity only reaches its fulfillment
when the human is united with the divine. Calvin is insightful enough to
realize that this christologically-conditioned account of grace has a negative
corollary (“without me, you can do nothing,” John 15:5). Both the positive
and “negative” aspects of this christological principle apply to all human-
ity—through Calvin’s concept of “common grace” and the imago dei (which
entails “participation in God.”)63 Yet humanity finds fullness through faith in
Christ, in whom God and humanity are reconciled and fully united. Calvin’s
emphasis upon the powerful effects of human sin does not lead to a “nega-
tive” anthropology. Rather, his concern for alienation from God by sin is part
of a larger soteriological account that seeks to remedy what sin disrupts: the
original goodness of creation, corrupted by sin, can be restored only through
union with God, in Christ, by the Spirit.
Considering Calvin’s emphasis upon union with God in Christ through
the Spirit, how does his theology relate to the language of “participation as
deification” that Milbank utilizes in Being Reconciled? On this point also,
Calvin may have more commonality with Milbank than is generally recog-
nized. Contemporary discussions of deification and theosis are plagued by
two opposing tendencies: on the one hand, some works use a late Byzantine
standard of theosis to evaluate and polarize Western theologians such as
Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, claiming that their distance from late
Byzantine terminology leads to fundamentally deficient notions of deifica-
tion.64 On the other side, certain recent works have failed to recognize the dis-
tance that genuinely exists between late Byzantine theologies and Western
theologians who do not share their categories or terms.65 In the midst of this
discussion, Milbank presents an account of “participation as deification”
whose strengths lie precisely in his Anglican eclecticism: he is happy to glean
insights from Maximus the Confessor alongside Augustine and Thomas.
Certain aspects of Milbank’s doctrine of deification—such as his interpreta-
tion of Thomas—are questionable on historical grounds.66 Yet, the way in
which Milbank creatively draws upon the traditions of East and West is
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Milbank’s Theology of “Gift” and Calvin’s Theology of Grace 97
NOTES
1 Portions of this essay were presented at Engaging Radical Orthodoxy, a conference at Calvin
College on September 14, 2003. I am grateful to Sarah Coakley, Benjamin King, Michael
Horton and Rachel Billings for their very helpful feedback in refining this essay.
2 John Milbank, “Can a Gift Be Given? Prolegomena to a Future Trinitarian Metaphysic”,
Modern Theology, Vol. 11, no. 1 (January, 1995), pp. 119–161; John Milbank, The Word Made
Strange: Theology, Language, Culture (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1997), chapter
2; John Milbank, “Gregory of Nyssa: The Force of Identity” in Christian Origins, ed. L. Ayres
and G. Jones (London: Routledge, 1998), pp. 94–116; John Milbank, “The Ethics of Self-
Sacrifice”, First Things, No. 91 (March, 1999), pp. 33–38; John Milbank, “The Soul of
Reciprocity. Part One, Reciprocity Refused”, Modern Theology, Vol. 17, no. 3 (July, 2001):
pp. 335–391; John Milbank, “The Soul of Reciprocity. Part Two, Reciprocity Granted”,
Modern Theology, Vol. 17, no. 4 (October, 2001), pp. 485–507.
3 Milbank identifies Nygren’s approach to agape as a “purism” regarding the gift, “which
renders it unilateral” and is thus “over-rigorous in a self-defeating fashion”. See “Can a
Gift be Given?”, p. 132, n. 31.
4 John Milbank, Being Reconciled: Ontology and Pardon, (London: Routledge, 2003).
5 See the articles in note 2.
6 See Marcel Mauss, The Gift: the Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies, trans.
W. D. Halls, (New York: W. W. Norton, 1990).
7 See Jacques Derrida, Given Time, I: Counterfeit Money, trans. Peggy Kamuf, (Chicago, IL:
University of Chicago Press, 1992), p. 24, emphasis added.
8 For Derrida, the gift “must remain aneconomic” and “foreign to the circle” of give and take
exchange (ibid., p. 7; also see ibid., pp. 7–13, 24–27). In contrast, Mauss’ central point about
giving is that from an anthropological perspective, gifts do exchange. While gifts may
appear to be “free”, they always incur obligation. Thus, Mauss’ The Gift seeks to discover
the logic behind this obligation. See The Gift, especially pp. 1–18.
9 Mary Douglas (see Preface to the 1990 Norton edition of Mauss); David Graeber, Toward an
Anthropological Theory of Value: The False Coin Of Our Own Dreams (New York: Palgrave,
2001).
10 While aspects of Mauss’ portrait of “gift exchange” may be romanticized, Mauss is very
clear that such practices often involve violence. Milbank recognizes that a gift economy is
not necessarily a peaceful economy; thus Milbank seeks to “purify” the gift economy from
the violence that it frequently entails. See “Can a Gift be Given?”, pp. 131–133.
11 Ibid., p. 131.
12 This connection is developed by Milbank in the final chapter of Theology and Social Theory
and is also well articulated by Rowan Williams in “Sapientia and the Trinity: reflections on
De trinitate” in Collectanea Augustiniana: mélanges T. J. van Bavel, T. J. van Bavel, Bernard
Bruning, Mathijs Lamberigts, and Jozef van Heutem, eds. (Leuven: Leuven University
Press, 1990), pp. 317–332.
13 “Can a Gift be Given?”, pp. 136–137, 144–154.
14 Ibid., pp. 124, 143–137.
15 Ibid., p. 137. “Soul of Reciprocity: Part Two”, p. 504.
16 Milbank coins the term “active reception” in his essay on Gregory and Nyssa and the Gift.
See Milbank, “Gregory of Nyssa: The Force of Identity”, p. 95. The phrase is helpful in
expressing Milbank’s constructive alternative to theologies of “passive” reception, a theme
dominating his essays on the Gift.
17 “Can a Gift be Given?”, p. 137.
18 Ibid., p. 136.
19 See Milbank, “The Ethics of Self-Sacrifice”.
20 Although Milbank makes many brief references to Kant in his “gift” articles, he presents a
sustained critique in “Soul of Reciprocity: Part One”, pp. 371–384. In the first part of this
account (pp. 371–377), Milbank makes it clear that his understanding of the notions of
“interest” and “feeling” in the Groundwork is foundational for his assessment of Kant’s
ethics. Milbank then extends this account of the notion of “interest” to Kant’s aesthetics in
the Third Critique (pp. 377–382), reading the First Critique in light of the Third Critique (pp.
382–384). While my account only directly addresses Milbank’s criticism of Kant’s ethics, I
sense that his understanding of the Third Critique and the First Critique would be quite dif-
ferent if he had a more nuanced understanding of the notions of “interest” and “feeling”
in the Groundwork.
21 See Immanuel Kant, Grundlegung Zur Metaphysik Der Sitten, ed. Karl Vorländer, Philosophis-
che Bibliothek, Bd. 41 (Leipzig: Dürr, 1906), especially pp. 395–401.
22 For an account of Kant’s notion of obligation which addresses the criticisms of the Ground-
work related to mutual affection and regard, see Christine M. Korsgaard, Creating the
Kingdom of Ends (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), pp. 55–67.
23 Derrida writes that “for there to be a gift, there must be no reciprocity, return, exchange,
countergift, or debt. If the other gives me back or owes me or has to give me back what I
give him or her, there will not have been a gift” (Given Time, p. 12). Thus, Derrida must
speak of the “forgetting and gift” as “the condition of the other” because anything recog-
nized as a receiver as a gift necessarily incurs obligation (pp. 17–18). Yet, for Derrida the
obligation is precisely what the gift seeks to overcome, for obligation always implies the
nomy of law, which is inseparable from economy (p. 6).
24 See Jean-Luc Marion, “The Saturated Phenomenon” in Phenomenology and the “Theological
Turn”: The French Debate (New York: Fordham University Press, 2000), pp. 176–216.
25 For more on Marion’s non-predicative form of apophaticism, see his reading of Denys in
Jean-Luc Marion, The Idol and Distance: Five Studies (New York: Fordham University Press,
2001).
26 Milbank, “Soul of Reciprocity: Part One”, p. 352.
27 Ibid., p. 353.
28 See especially, “Can a Gift be Given?”, pp. 132, 144–154.
29 John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Ford Lewis Battles; John T. McNeill
ed., (Philadelphia, PA: Westminster, 1960), 3:11:6.
30 See Institutes, 2:2:26–27.
31 With Luther, Calvin affirms that the first use of the law is to reveal our sinfulness and thus
lead to repentance; the second use of the law is to restrain evildoers in civil society. (Insti-
tutes, 2:7:6–11.) However, Calvin also teaches a third use of the law which he considers to
be primary: guidance for Christians in living a life of holiness (Institutes, 2:7:12). In Calvin’s
hands, the third use of the law makes an ethic of love, justice and equity central to sancti-
fication. See Guenther H. Haas, The Concept of Equity in Calvin’s Ethics (Waterloo, Ontario:
Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1997).
32 “Can a Gift be Given?”, p. 137.
33 Ibid., p. 136.
34 Ibid.
35 Institutes, 3:11:4–6.
36 Calvin’s use of the bilateral covenant is particularly prominent in his sermons on Deuteron-
omy. See Peter A. Lillback, The Binding of God: Calvin’s Role in the Development of Covenant
Theology (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2001), chapter 8. While Lillback does a service
in calling attention to this bilateral material, he does not give an adequate account of how
Calvin upholds a strong view of divine agency in the midst of this emphasis upon a bilat-
eral covenant. For a more satisfactory account of how Calvin holds together the unilateral
and bilateral covenant material, see Richard A. Muller, The Unaccommodated Calvin: Studies
in the Foundation of a Theological Tradition (New York: Oxford University, 2000), pp. 154ff.
37 See especially “The Soul of Reciprocity: Part One” and “The Soul of Reciprocity: Part Two”.
38 My own translation of “et quemadmodum unus est in patre, ita nos unum in ipso fiamus”.
Sermon on 1 Samuel, 2:27–36 found in Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia from Corpus
Reformatorum, G. Baum, E. Cunitz, E. Reuss, and E. Alfred, eds., (Brunsvigae: C. A.
Schwetschke, 1863–1900), 29:353.
39 Commentary on 1 Corinthians 11:24 in Calvin’s Commentaries, trans. Calvin Translation
Society, John King et al. eds., (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1845/1981). See also Ioannis Calvini
opera quae supersunt omnia, 49:487.
40 “Perichoresis” is not a term that Calvin uses, but Butin uses it to describe the mutual
indwelling and interpenetration between the divine and the human in Calvin’s trinitarian
theology. See Philip Butin, Revelation, Redemption, and Response: Calvin’s Trinitarian Under-
standing of the Divine-Human Relationship (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp.
42, 82–83.
41 While the first part of this essay responds to the use of key terms such as “passivity”, “uni-
lateral”, and “reciprocity” in Milbank’s early gift essays, one should note that he contin-
ues to use these terms extensively in Being Reconciled. Thus, although the second part of
this essay interacts with other aspects of Being Reconciled, my critique of the earlier work
applies to Being Reconciled as well.
42 Being Reconciled sets forth Milbank’s constructive project to be continued in later books
expositing a theology of the gift. In a forthcoming essay, “Alternative Protestantism”,
Milbank explicitly interacts with Reformed theology and Calvin. However, this essay
speaks in terms of the broad aims of Radical Orthodoxy rather than the specific concerns
of a theology of the “gift”. Since a general account of the relation between Radical Ortho-
doxy and Reformed theology is beyond this scope of this essay, I will only draw upon
“Alternative Protestantism” where it clarifies Milbank’s defense of his Gift theology. See
John Milbank, “Alternative Protestantism” in Creation, Covenant and Participation: Radical
Orthodoxy and the Reformed Tradition, James K. A. Smith and James H. Olthius, eds., (Grand
Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2005).
43 Adolf von Harnack, History of Dogma, trans. James Miller, (London: Williams & Norgate,
1897), Vol. 3, p. 165. Gerald Bonner, “Augustine’s Conception of Deification”, Journal of The-
ological Studies, Vol. 37, no. 2 (October, 1986), pp. 369–386; Gerald Bonner, “Deification,
Divinization” in Augustine through the Ages, Allan D. Fitzgerald, ed., (Grand Rapids, MI:
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1999), pp. 265–266.
44 On the importance of identifying the differences between the various theologies which
claim to teach “deification”, see Gosta Hallosten “The Concept of Theosis in Recent
Research—the Need for a Clarification” and J. Todd Billings, “United to God through
Christ: Assessing Calvin on the Question of Deification”. Both essays are forthcoming in
Partakers of the Divine Nature: Deification/Theosis in the Christian Tradition, James Pain,
Michael Christensen, and Boris Jakim, eds.
45 See Edmund Newey, “The Form of Reason: Participation in the Work of Richard Hooker,
Benjamin Whichcote, Ralph Cudworth and Jeremy Taylor”, Modern Theology, Vol.18, no. 1
(January, 2002), pp. 1–26. Unfortunately, Newey tends to caricature Calvin and “reforma-
tion” theology, so he does not see how Hooker and the Cambridge Platonists exhibit con-
tinuity with Calvin precisely in the language of participation which Newey traces.
46 See especially Newman’s Christmas Day sermon on “The Incarnation” in Parochial and Plain
Sermons (San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 1987) pp. 242–250.
47 Milbank, Being Reconciled, p. 138.
48 Ibid., pp. 7–12.
49 Milbank repeatedly points to the “Lutherans” as the example of this distortion, but also
uses language indicating that this critique applies more generally to common Reformation
and post-Reformation readings of Augustine. See Being Reconciled, pp. 9–10, n. 2; p. 214.
50 The addition is lengthy, but the first part is particularly significant: “I say that the will is
effaced; not in so far as it is will, for in man’s conversion what belongs to his primal nature
remains entire.” Institutes, 2:3:6.
51 The Bondage and Liberation of the Will: A Defence of the Orthodox Doctrine of Human Choice
against Pighius, trans. Graham I. Davies, A. N. S. Lane, ed., (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1996),
p. 212.
52 “It was the spiritual life of Adam to remain united and bound to his Maker.” Institutes,
2:1:5.
53 See Bondage and Liberation of the Will references in Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia,
2:263, 264, 284, 290, 4:331, 5:361, 6:381. Also see “Calvin’s Use of Aristotle” in Lane’s intro-
duction to Bondage and Liberation of the Will, pp. xxiv–xxvi.
54 Institutes, 2:2:1.
55 See Bondage and Liberation of the Will in Ioannis Calvini opera quae supersunt omnia, 2:259,
263–264.
56 In “Alternative Protestantism”, Milbank does recognize a point of commonality with
Calvin on the notion that true freedom must be divinely empowered by the Spirit. See
“Alternative Protestantism”, p. 7.
57 Institutes, 3:20:1.
58 Institutes, 3:20:4, 8, 11. Calvin articulates a set of “rules” to right prayer in Institutes,
3:20:4–14.
59 See especially Institutes, 3:20:4–5.
60 Institutes, 3:20:1.
61 Institutes, 3:20:3.
62 Institutes, 3:20:5, emphasis added.
63 Institutes, 2:2:1.
64 For an influential approach undergirding many East versus West accounts of deification,
see Vladimir Lossky, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (Crestwood, NY: St.
Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1976), pp. 130–34, 96–216. For the use of Gregory Palamas
“against” Thomas Aquinas, see Eric D. Perl, “St. Gregory Palamas and the Metaphysics of
Creation”, Dionysius, Vol. 14 (December, 1990), pp. 105–130. For an evaluation of Calvin by
late Byzantine standards, see the appendix of Joseph P. Farrell, Free Choice in St. Maximus
the Confessor (South Canan, PA: St. Tikhon’s Seminary Press, 1989).
65 This is the tendency of much of the Finnish school on Luther. See Carl E. Braaten and Robert
W. Jenson, Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther (Grand Rapids, MI:
Eerdmans, 1998); Tuomo Mannermaa, Der Im Glauben Gegenwärtige Christus: Rechtfertigung
Und Vergottung Zum Ökumenischen Dialog (Hannover: Lutherisches Verlagshaus, 1989).
However, Reinhard Flogaus does seek to differentiate Luther more carefully from Palamas
while still affirming that Luther teaches deification. See Reinhard Flogaus, Theosis Bei
Palamas Und Luther: Ein Beitrag Zum Ökumenischen Gespräch (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht, 1997). For an account which overestimates the commonality between Calvin and
Palamas, see Joseph C. McLelland, “Sailing to Byzantium” in The New Man: An Orthodox
and Reformed Dialogue, John Meyendorff and Joseph C. McLelland eds., (New Brunswick,
NJ: Agora Books, 1973), pp. 10–25.
66 Milbank’s account of Aquinas on deification, for example, is Aquinas read through a dis-
tinctly Neoplatonic lens, with contemporary constructive concerns at the forefront. As
Christine Helmer notes about Truth in Aquinas, the most charitable (and helpful) way to
engage this approach is frankly to admit that aspects of it are historically questionable,
while nevertheless engaging the contemporary theological concerns that such a reading
raises. For both historical questioning and constructive engagement with Milbank’s reading
of Aquinas, see Christine Helmer’s review, “Truth in Aquinas”, International Journal of Sys-
tematic Theology, Vol. 5, no. 1 (March, 2003), pp. 93–95; Aidan Nichols’ review, “Truth in
Aquinas”, Theology, Vol. 104, no. 820 (July/August, 2001), pp. 288–289.
67 Both the Finnish School (see note 41 and 65) and Anna Williams tend to overestimate the
similarities between Western conceptions of deification and late Byzantine notions of
theosis. See A. N. Williams, The Ground of Union: Deification in Aquinas and Palamas (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1999). See also Nonna Verna Harrison’s review, “The
Ground of Union: Deification in Aquinas and Palamas”, St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly,
Vol. 45, no. 4 (2001), pp. 418–421.
68 See Calvin’s commentary on 2 Peter 1:4 in Calvin’s Commentaries and in Ioannis Calvini opera
quae supersunt omnia, 55:446.
69 This can be inferred from Milbank’s comments on Luther’s “Scotist” metaphysic. See Being
Reconciled, p. 214, n21. In “Alternative Protestantism”, Milbank expresses uncertainty about
the extent to which Calvin shares this metaphysic with Luther, but Milbank thinks Calvin
is probably less of a “Scotist” than Luther. “Alternative Protestantism”, pp. 6–7.
70 For more on these biblical and patristic elements of Calvin’s teaching on deification, see
J. Todd Billings, “United to God through Christ: Assessing Calvin on the Question of
Deification”.
71 Richard A. Muller, The Unaccommodated Calvin, chapter 7.
72 There are many examples of participation language applied to a variety of loci. Here are a
few examples from the Institutes on the topics listed above: justification (3:17:11), baptism
(4:16:2), the Lord’s Supper (4:17:10), the resurrection (3:3:9), the incarnation (2:12:5), Trinity
(4:1:3), the atonement (2:16:12), the imago dei (2:2:1), and “participation in God” (1:13:14).
73 Contemporary discussion of deification/theosis has frequently followed Lossky in seeking
to avoid the “negative” tendencies of western accounts of sin and grace. However, rather
than giving an alternative, fully developed hamartology (in dialogue with Paul’s strong
language of Romans 1–3), contemporary accounts frequently move quickly on to the more
comfortable language of adoption, participation and indwelling (Romans 6 and 8). In con-
trast, Calvin combines a strong harmatology with a strong theology of participation.
74 See especially Being Reconciled, pp. 7–12.
75 Some readers may wonder whether a sola scriptura theologian like Calvin would think it is
worth the effort to argue that he is closer to a father like Augustine than another theologi-
cal interlocutor. Yet Calvin clearly did. Calvin’s chief burden in Bondage and Liberation of
the Will is not a scriptural defense of his position, but an argument that his account is a
better appropriation of Augustine and other fathers than Pighius is able to give.
76 See Muller’s account of the “central dogma theories” in Calvin scholarship in chapters 4
and 5 of After Calvin: Studies in the Development of a Theological Tradition (Oxford; New York:
Oxford University Press, 2003).
77 Muller chronicles this change in Calvin scholarship in The Unaccommodated Calvin and After
Calvin, Part 1.
78 For example, when Milbank claims to exposit Paul in Being Reconciled, pp. 7–9, he never
returns to the language or the text of Paul but keeps with the language of Augustine.
79 See especially Augustine’s extensive review of relevant passages of scripture in Books 2–4
of De Trinitate.
80 Nichols, “Truth in Aquinas”, p. 289.
81 In Book 5, chapter 3 of De Trinitate, Augustine seeks to articulate distinctive names for each
person of the Trinity which express their eternal relation to the Godhead. The Son’s rela-
tionship to the Father is one of eternal relation, for the Son is eternally begotten of the
Father. What are we to say about the Spirit? The Spirit proceeds from the Father and the
Son (filioque), and is called the “gift of God” (Acts 8:20). Thus, Augustine proposes “gift”
as a possible name for the Spirit to express this eternal relationship of procession.
82 In The Word Made Strange, Milbank calls Moltmann’s social trinitarianism an “effectively
tritheistic” approach (p. 180). Milbank does not want to advocate a “social” trinitarianism,
and Milbank’s trinitarian theology of the Gift is quite distant from Moltmann; yet, the
notion of “exchange” and self-giving between the persons of the Trinity posits a mode of
relation with a greater externalist tendency than traditional notions of “generation” and
“procession”. In addition, by adding “exchange” to the modes of relation in the inner-
Triune life, Milbank’s move has a speculative character that pushes the boundaries of
apophatic modesty.
83 See Hans Urs von Balthasar, Theo-Drama: Theological Dramatic Theory, trans. Graham
Harrison (San Francisco, CA: Ignatius Press, 1988), Vol. 3, pp. 515–523 and Vol. 4, pp.
317–332.
84 See Summa Theologica, Vol. 1, Pt. 1., Q. 38, Art. 1 and 2. Also see Yves Cognar’s, I Believe in
the Holy Spirit, trans. David Smith (New York: Seabury Press, 1983), Vol. 1, p. 90.
85 See Cognar, I Believe in the Holy Spirit, Vol. 3, pp. 84–88. An important reason for the near-
absence in the East of using the name “Gift” to express the Spirit’s eternal relation to the
Godhead is the Augustinian connection of the Spirit as “Gift” with the filioque clause. For
Augustine, the term “Gift” is appropriate because the Spirit proceeds from the Father and
the Son.