In order for you to know my beef with Charles Finney and how he ties to Pelagius, you have to have a general understanding of where the church was and where it is today. You’re asking a lot for me to give you the history of the church succinctly but here’s go.
Pelagius was a monk around 350 AD who denied the existence of original sin (man was tainted with Adam's sin) among other things. The most destructive view of Pelagius was his view that man had a free will to do good or evil apart from divine grace. IOW, in the Pelagius view, man was capable of choosing God and choosing not to sin. He didn’t need help from God.
Up until this point the church had always held that God empowered man. Augustine, and the church, declared Pelagius ideas about original sin and his views on man's free will to be heresy. Augustine (and the church) asserted all things come to us by God's grace including our salvation.
One would have thought that that would be the end of it but Pelagius student, John Cassian, took Pelagius' works and made modification to the doctrine into what is now known as Semi-Pelagian. This view emphasized the role of free will in that the first steps of salvation is in the power of the individual, without the need for divine grace. In other words, man makes a decision for God and then is helped to live his life by God.
Semi-Pelagian was condemned heretical by the Council of Orange of 529 AD. The Council of Orange once again affirmed that only through God’s grace that are we capable of knowing Him. Although Cassian's view was considered heretical, Cassian remained in the Church and, subsequently became a saint due to some things that he did for the Pope. His view never formally died out in the Church but it festered along with Augustine's view on divine grace.
Eventually, Augustine's view that we are saved by grace and not by man's will became obscured. But to say that the Reformation was centered on the free will of man would not be totally true (although I think it played more of a part than most historians give it credit). Other issues caused the future Reformers to go back to reexamine the writings of the early fathers in light of what was being taught by the Church. Primarily the Protestant Reformers drew upon the writings of Augustine. Many of the early Protestant creeds and confessions (London Baptists, Westminster, Belgic, etc.) centers on Augustine’s belief that God saves men. IOW, God choose us to be part of His kingdom. He opened our eyes, gave us faith, and set our feet so that we could live for Him. We did not choose Him but He chose us. We were dead in sin. We now have been born again because of God. Man's capability to freely choose only come in to play in that man will always make bad choices unless God changes men to make good choices. We chose God because He gave us that power. And we can make choices now because He has restored us to Himself and guides us.
The Roman Catholics had all but abandoned the view that God saved man apart from himself. Their view became a still modified Semi-Pelagian view that God reveals himself to man and man makes a choice. Man cooperates with God. This is documented in the Council of Trent which formally abandons Augustine’s view of salvation.
It would have been easy if this would have been the defining distinction between Protestants and Catholics. Unfortunately, about 150 years after the Reformation, a Protestant by the name of Joseph Arminian came on the scene. Arminian’s writings are rather obscured, but his followers formed in Protestantism what was known as the Remonstrant. The Remonstrants essentially stated the same thing the Roman Catholics were stating; that the fall of man was man’s choosing and man could be reconciled to God, with God’s help, simply by choosing God. But it was man's choice. This was deemed heretical by the Protestants who, once again, insisted that God choose and elect men, not the other way.
Charles Finney did not consider this at all heretical and, to his credit, said so. Even though he was a Presbyterian minister, he held to a Roman Catholic view on many issues including man’s ability to choose his salvation. While he might have been considered by some such as Billy Graham, as one of the great evangelists, his doctrine is totally inconsistent with what Protestantism was originally about; God saving men.
Charles Finney’s Influence on American Evangelicalism by Bob DeWaay
Wow, thanks for all your effort. There’s lots I don’t know. This is very enlightning. Bless you. Maryxxx
That is a gross misrepresentation (and, of course, you copied it from Wikipedia almost word by word; btw, Wikipedia has been already cited as a source of many erroneous and misleading entries).
The Orthodox Church states
Semi-Pelagian was condemned heretical by the Council of Orange of 529 AD...Although Cassian's view was considered heretical, Cassian remained in the Church and, subsequently became a saint due to some things that he did for the Pope
The Council of Orange was a local council and could not proclaim anyone heretical on behalf of the whole Church. You have been shown this to be so in the past but you persist in your error. The fact that +Cassian remained in the Church is no different than +Augustine remaining in the Church, as both have taught things which was not universally accepted in the entire Church.
The Church always held that our salvation is incumbent on Resurrection, and God's grace. Since Pelagian denied grace, he was condemned (anathematized) as a heretic. Semi-Pelagianism does not deny grace and is therefore not a heresy.
First of all Harley, the early church did NOT deny Free Will
St. Justin Martyr
First Apology (2nd century)
Chapter 43. Responsibility asserted.
But lest some suppose, from what has been said by us, that we say that whatever happens, happens by a fatal necessity, because it is foretold as known beforehand, this too we explain. We have learned from the prophets, and we hold it to be true, that punishments, and chastisements, and good rewards, are rendered according to the merit of each man’s actions. Since if it be not so, but all things happen by fate, neither is anything at all in our own power. For if it be fated that this man, e.g., be good, and this other evil, neither is the former meritorious nor the latter to be blamed. And again, unless the human race have the power of avoiding evil and choosing good by free choice, they are not accountable for their actions, of whatever kind they be. BUT IT IS BY FREE CHOICE they both walk uprightly and stumble, we thus demonstrate. We see the same man making a transition to opposite things. Now, if it had been fated that he were to be either good or bad, he could never have been capable of both the opposites, nor of so many transitions. But not even would some be good and others bad, since we thus make fate the cause of evil, and exhibit her as acting in opposition to herself; or that which has been already stated would seem to be true, that neither virtue nor vice is anything, but that things are only reckoned good or evil by opinion; which, as the true word shows, is the greatest impiety and wickedness. But this we assert is inevitable fate, that they who CHOOSE the good have worthy rewards, and they who CHOOSE the opposite have their merited awards. For not like other things, as trees and quadrupeds, which cannot act by choice, did God make man: for neither would he be worthy of reward or praise did he not of himself choose the good, but were created for this end; nor, if he were evil, would he be worthy of punishment, not being evil of himself, but being able to be nothing else than what he was made.
IRENAEUS of Gaul c.130-200. Against Heresies XXXVII
“This expression, ‘How often would I have gathered thy children together, and thou wouldst not,’ set forth the ancient law of human liberty, because God made man a free (agent) from the beginning, possessing his own soul to obey the behests of God voluntarily, and not by compulsion of God. For there is no coercion with God, but a good will (toward us) is present with Him continually. And therefore does He give good counsel to all. And in man as well as in angels, He has placed the power of choice (for angels are rational beings), so that those who had yielded obedience might justly possess what is good, given indeed by God, but preserved by themselves . . .”
“If then it were not in our power to do or not to do these things, what reason had the apostle, and much more the Lord Himself, to give counsel to do some things and to abstain from others? But because man is possessed of free-will from the beginning, and God is possessed of free-will in whose likeness man was created, advice is always given to him to keep fast the good, which thing is done by means of obedience to God.”
From Saint Augustine -A.D. 426 or 427
On Grace and Free Will
Chapter 2
“Now He has revealed to us, through His Holy Scriptures, that there is in a man a free choice of will.”
Chapter 4
“”What is the import of the fact that in so many passages God requires all His commandments to be kept and fulfilled? How does He make this requisition, if there is no free will? What means “the happy man,” of whom the Psalmist says that “his will has been the law of the Lord”? Does he not clearly enough show that a man by his own will takes his stand in the law of God? Then again, there are so many commandments which in some way are expressly adapted to the human will; for instance, there is, “Be not overcome of evil,” Romans 12:1 and others of similar import, such as, “Be not like a horse or a mule, which have no understanding;” and, “Reject not the counsels of your mother;” Proverbs 1:8 and, “Be not wise in your own conceit;” Proverbs 3:7 and, “Despise not the chastening of the Lord;” Proverbs 3:11 and, “Forget not my law;” Proverbs 3:1 and, “Forbear not to do good to the poor;” Proverbs 3:27 and, “Devise not evil against your friend;” Proverbs 3:29 and, “Give no heed to a worthless woman;” Proverbs 5:2 and, “He is not inclined to understand how to do good;” and, “They refused to attend to my counsel;” Proverbs 1:30 with numberless other passages of the inspired Scriptures of the Old Testament. And what do they all show us but the free choice of the human will””
Harley,
Perhaps if I can find the time I,ll post more of the early fathers and free will.
I think if that ole spinmiester John Calvin were alive today he would be a Democrat -:)
Hope all is well with you and your family.
I wish you a Blessed day!