Philotheos

The Worst Protestant Heresy: Assurance?

I was recently pointed to an interesting if not inflammatory point regarding Bellarmine’s polemics against the Protestants: that the chief heresy of the Protestants is their doctrine of assurance. It seems that this is an error.

I believe this claim may be sourced from an essay of Dr. Sinclair Ferguson, though of course Dr. Ferguson could have inherited it himself. His essay was actually picked up by a Roman Catholic writer who almost caught the error and put in far more effort than he should have to discover it. Specifically, he knew where in Bellarmine to go, translated the first two chapters, and demonstrated how the conclusion of Dr. Ferguson doesn’t make sense. Had he only proceeded two more sentences, he would have saved himself an hour or two:

On one occasion, he wrote: “The greatest of all Protestant heresies is _______ ."[1] Complete, explain, and discuss Bellarmine’s statement. … What he wrote was: “The greatest of all Protestant heresies is assurance.”

Let us note the footnote which Mr. Gaetano seems to have missed:

[1] Robert Bellarmine, Tertiae Controversiae Generalis: Controversia Secunda Generalis Quae Est De Justificatione Impii, Book III. Chapter 3. His exact words are: “Primus est, omnium huius temporis haereticorum”–which I interpret specifically as “Protestant” since it is the Reformers with whom he takes issue in the context of enjoying assurance of salvation, contrary to Trent’s teaching.

The citation is not meaningless if you are familiar with the sources, but you might struggle otherwise as Bellarmine didn’t write a work called “Tertiae Controversiae Generalis”! Anyway, Dr. Ferguson is sending us to Bellarmine’s De Controversiis. It’s a difficult scan, but you can read the source here (p239A, upper left):

CAPVT III Recensentur variae sententiae de proposita quaestione

De Proposita igitur quæstione tres videntur esse sententiæ, sive potius errores. Primus est, omnium huius temporis Hæreticorum qui tria docent. Primo, posse fideles eam notitiam habere de sua gratia, ut certa fide statuant, sibi remissa esse peccata. Secundo, non solum posse sed etiam debere omnes hoc de se statuere, alioqui nec fideles, nec iustos futuros. Tertio, hac ipsa fide et sola hac fide homines iustificari.

If it is Dr. Ferguson who has discovered this text and written his piece without others delivering this opinion to him, then I think he is being a little free with Bellarmine’s words. The Cardinal seems rather to have written, and I have emboldened the sentence Dr. Ferguson is loosely quoting (yet with quotation marks):

There seem to be three proposed opinions, or rather errors, concerning this question. The first [error] is held by the present-day heretics who teach three [articles]. Firstly, it is possible for the faithful to have certainty of his grace in order by certain faith to determine that their sins are remitted. Secondly, that not only can all but all also ought to determine this for themselves, otherwise they will be neither faithful nor just. Thirdly, by this faith and only this faith are men justified.

No doubt Bellarmine’s wording is not the clearest in this place. But the reading Dr. Ferguson has taken, to wit, that “the greatest of all Protestant heresies¹ is assurance”, seems to require either (a) that “primus” refer to the first “article” of the Protestants which presents assurance positively; or (b) that the list of the three errors be a ranking, and that “primus [error]” mean “the chief error” encapsulating the three articles.

To (a), it seems that Bellarmine introduces the articles with “qui tria docent” (who teach three things) meaning that these things are all equally subordinated to and together constitute aspects of the “primus [error]”. Note also I have supplied the word error (the last word of the prior sentence) because this is the only word with which primus can reasonably agree: tria is neuter and sententia feminine. On grammatical grounds it is certain that primus does not refer to assurance.

To (b), we note the chapter title which just means various opinions are listed without any idea of ranking attached. We note also that the third of the Protestant articles is iustificatio sola fide which is to be distinguished from assurance, so even on a charitable reading, the “primus error” cannot refer, as Dr. Ferguson states, to assurance without equally applying to Justification by Faith. The latter would make for a less snappy second paragraph, to be sure. The listing of the opinion of the Protestants (Luther, Melanchthon, Calvin, Chemnitz) and the two subsequent opinions was done in this way because each subsequent opinion negates an additional of the three articles held by the Protestants which is, honestly, pretty nicely done.

Either way, it seems that Bellarmine did not say the chief heresy of the Protestants is their doctrine of assurance—at least not in this place.