Free-Will-ism and the Canons of the Council of Orange
Unless he be perpetually reminded of the free and unconditional nature of the gospel, and therein sustained and preserved by God, a person will, in accordance with a universal natural inclination of man, tend to regress and revert back toward a kind of works-righteousness, or Pelagianism (i.e., the idea that he must in some sense and to some degree earn or merit his salvation). Though natural, the error known as "Pelagianism" was clearly condemned by the the Second Council of Orange (529 AD). The medieval scholastic theologians (viz., those of the Via Moderna, against whose theology Luther specifically reacted) don't seem to have known about or had access to these cannons. For, theologians such as Gabriel Biel, while thinking themselves to have avoided the Pelagian error, had in fact become ensnared in it. The Reformers did utilize these canons, which was a powerful demonstration against the Catholic Church.
The content of the Council itself naturally grew out of the public dispute between Augustine and Pelagius. This critical dispute had to do with the extent to which the natural man is responsible for his own regeneration (the new birth)—i.e. whether the work of God in regeneration monergistic (God alone) or synergistic (a cooperation of man and God). The council supported Augustine's monergism, rejecting Pelagianism of any degree. Here are four of the most important canons:
CANON 4. If anyone maintains that God awaits our will to be cleansed from sin, but does not confess that even our will to be cleansed comes to us through the infusion and working of the Holy Spirit, he resists the Holy Spirit himself who says through Solomon, "The will is prepared by the Lord" (Prov. 8:35, LXX), and the salutary word of the Apostle, "For God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure" (Phil. 2:13).
CANON 5. If anyone says that not only the increase of faith but also its beginning and the very desire for faith, by which we believe in Him who justifies the ungodly and comes to the regeneration of holy baptism -- if anyone says that this belongs to us by nature and not by a gift of grace, that is, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit amending our will and turning it from unbelief to faith and from godlessness to godliness, it is proof that he is opposed to the teaching of the Apostles, for blessed Paul says, "And I am sure that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ" (Phil. 1:6). And again, "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God" (Eph. 2:8). For those who state that the faith by which we believe in God is natural make all who are separated from the Church of Christ by definition in some measure believers.
CANON 6. If anyone says that God has mercy upon us when, apart from his grace, we believe, will, desire, strive, labor, pray, watch, study, seek, ask, or knock, but does not confess that it is by the infusion and inspiration of the Holy Spirit within us that we have the faith, the will, or the strength to do all these things as we ought; or if anyone makes the assistance of grace depend on the humility or obedience of man and does not agree that it is a gift of grace itself that we are obedient and humble, he contradicts the Apostle who says, "What have you that you did not receive?" (1 Cor. 4:7), and, "But by the grace of God I am what I am" (1 Cor. 15:10).
CANON 7. If anyone affirms that we can form any right opinion or make any right choice which relates to the salvation of eternal life, as is expedient for us, or that we can be saved, that is, assent to the preaching of the gospel through our natural powers without the illumination and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, who makes all men gladly assent to and believe in the truth, he is led astray by a heretical spirit, and does not understand the voice of God who says in the Gospel, "For apart from me you can do nothing" (John 15:5), and the word of the Apostle, "Not that we are competent of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our competence is from God" (2 Cor. 3:5).
But why ought Christians to concern themselves with such seemingly trivial and troublesome points of doctrine such as free will? Martin Luther has a blunt (and perhaps offensive) answer for us in his 1525 On the Bondage of the Will:
It is not irreverent, inquisitive, or superfluous, but essentially salutary and necessary for a Christian, to find out whether the will does anything or nothing in matters pertaining to eternal salvation . . . , to inquire what free choice can do, what it has done to it, and what is its relation to the grace of God. If we do not know these things, we shall know nothing at all of things Christian, and shall be worse than any heathen. . . . For if I am ignorant of what, how far, and how much I can and may do in relation to God, it will be equally uncertain and unknown to me, what, how far, and how much God can and may do in me . . . . But when the works and power of God are unknown, I cannot worship, praise, thank, and serve God, since I do not know how much I ought to attribute to myself and how much to God. It therefore behooves us to be very certain about the distinction between God's power and our own, God's work and our own, if we want to live a godly life. (117)
