ANTINOMIANI. — The word was coined by Luther himself in the controversy with Giovanni Agricola, his disciple, to characterize the doctrine according to which the Christian had been freed from observance of the ancient Law, and therefore from the very precepts of the Decalogue.
From the earliest times of Christianity there were sectarians, including the Nicolaitans, the Gnostics, etc., who, on the pretext that the ancient Law had been abolished, proclaimed even the most sinful acts lawful. This error reappeared among the new Nicolaitans of the eleventh century and, according to some, among the Apostolics of the twelfth century. The Anabaptists of the sixteenth century, moreover, claimed to be free from observance of any civil law. In the first half of the sixteenth century, Giovanni Agricola deduced from the doctrine of his teacher concerning « faith without works » that, if the Christian is saved by faith alone, it was pointless to be concerned with the morality or immorality of his actions. Although Agricola was reconciled, at least outwardly, with Luther and recanted his error, the latter continued to spread, especially on the occasion of the dispute between Giorgio Major, who maintained the necessity of good works, and Nicola Amsdorf, who, developing Luther’s doctrine, asserted that good works, besides being useless, were also an obstacle to salvation. With the « Formula of Concord » of 1577, the issue subsided for some time. Antinomianism reappeared vigorously in the seventeenth century among the English Puritans and Independents. Some derived it from the Calvinist theory of the decree, since, if it had been decreed by God that some men should be saved and others condemned, the decree had to be inexorably fulfilled, whatever life such men led; others, instead, deduced it from the doctrine of the inadmissibility of righteousness, according to which the sins committed by the righteous—and all those who upheld this doctrine considered themselves such—were not sins, because they did not take away righteousness.
These extreme theories, with the restoration of the monarchy and Anglicanism, were no longer openly manifested. The Anglican bishops kept watch, and Wesley himself, accused of antinomianism, had to defend himself before the Bishop of London, Edmond Gibson. The « Moravian Brethren » were also accused of antinomianism. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, antinomianism reappeared with renewed force in a select group of English society, nor should it even today be regarded as having entirely disappeared.