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103. Accordingly, when we hear and read in sacred
Scripture that God "willeth that all men should be
saved,"(221) although we know well enough that not
all men are saved, we are not on that account to
underrate the fully omnipotent will of God. Rather,
we must understand the Scripture, "Who will have all
men to be saved," as meaning that no man is saved
unless God willeth his salvation: not that there is
no man whose salvation he doth not will, but that no
one is saved unless He willeth it. Moreover, his will
should be sought in prayer, because if he willeth,
then what he willeth must necessarily be.
And, indeed, it was of prayer to God that the
apostle was speaking when he made that statement.
Thus, we are also to understand what is written in
the Gospel about Him "who enlighteneth every
man."(222) This means that there is no man who is
enlightened except by God.
In any case, the word concerning God, "who will have
all men to be saved," does not mean that there is no
one whose salvation he doth not will--he who was
unwilling to work miracles among those who, he said,
would have repented if he had wrought them--but by
"all men" we are to understand the whole of mankind,
in every single group into which it can be divided:
kings and subjects; nobility and plebeians; the high
and the low; the learned and unlearned; the healthy
and the sick; the bright, the dull, and the stupid;
the rich, the poor, and the middle class; males,
females, infants, children, the adolescent, young
adults and middle-aged and very old; of every tongue
and fashion, of all the arts, of all professions,
with the countless variety of wills and minds and all
the other things that differentiate people. For from
which of these groups doth not God will that some men
from every nation should be saved through his only
begotten Son our Lord? Therefore, he doth save them
since the Omnipotent cannot will in vain, whatsoever
he willeth. Now, the apostle had enjoined that
prayers should be offered "for all men"(223) and
especially "for kings and all those of exalted
station,"(224) whose worldly pomp and pride could be
supposed to be a sufficient cause for them to despise
the humility of the Christian faith. Then, continuing
his argument, "for this is good and acceptable in the
sight of God our Saviour"(225) that is, to pray even
for such as these [kings]--the apostle, to remove any
warrant for despair, added, "Who willeth that all men
be saved and come to the knowledge of the
truth."(226)
Truly, then, God hath judged it good that through
the prayers of the lowly he would deign to grant
salvation to the exalted--a paradox we have already
seen exemplified. Our Lord also useth the same manner
of speech in the Gospel, where he saith to the
Pharisees, "You tithe mint and rue and every
herb."(227) Obviously, the Pharisees did not tithe
what belonged to others, nor all the herbs of all the
people of other lands. Therefore, just as we should
interpret "every herb" to mean "every kind of herb,"
so also we can interpret "all men" to mean "all kinds
of men." We could interpret it in any other fashion,
as long as we are not compelled to believe that the
Omnipotent hath willed anything to be done which was
not done. "He hath done all things in heaven and
earth, whatsoever he willed,"(228) as Truth sings of
him, and surely he hath not willed to do anything
that he hath not done. There must be no equivocation
on this point. |