Antinomians

ANTINOMIANS. - The word was coined by Luther himself in the controversy with Johann Agricola, his disciple, to characterize the doctrine by which it was maintained that the Christian had been freed from the observance of the old Law, and therefore from the very precepts of the Decalogue.

From the earliest times of Christianity there were sectarians, among them the Nicolaitans, the Gnostics, etc., who, under the pretext that the old Law had been abolished, proclaimed even the most sinful acts to be lawful. This error was reborn in the new Nicolaitans of the 11th century and, according to some, in the Apostolics of the 12th century. The Anabaptists of the 16th century, moreover, claimed to be free from the observance of any civil law. In the first half of the 16th century Johann Agricola derived from his master's doctrine of "faith without works" that, if the Christian is saved only by faith, it was useless to worry about the morality or immorality of his acts. Although Agricola was reconciled, at least outwardly, with Luther and retracted his error, it continued, spreading especially on the occasion of the dispute between Georg Major, who maintained the necessity of good works, and Nikolaus 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 question calmed down for some time. Antinomianism was reborn vigorously in the 17th century among the English Puritans and Independents. Some derived it from the Calvinist theory of the decree, since, if it was decreed by God that part of men should be saved and part damned, the decree had to be inexorably fulfilled, whatever the life led by such men; others, on the other hand, deduced it from the doctrine of the inadmissibility of righteousness, according to which the sins committed by the righteous - and all who held this doctrine believed themselves to be such - were not sins, because they did not take away righteousness.

These extreme theories, with the restoration of the monarchy and of Anglicanism, no longer manifested themselves openly. The Anglican bishops kept watch, and Wesley himself, accused of antinomianism, had to clear himself before the Bishop of London, Edmund Gibson. The "Moravian Brethren" were also accused of antinomianism. At the beginning of the 19th century antinomianism was reborn with new strength in a select group of English society, nor is it to be considered even today entirely extinct.

Camillo Crivelli