The first and most important problem with the “covenantal justification” approach that he noted is that it is not taught in Scripture (p. 134–35). The second problem is that such a view necessarily puts baptism in charge of election, when, in fact, according to Scripture, baptism works for election not the other way round. Witsius knew nothing of a conditional election (such a view would have made him a Remonstrant, against which he was squarely opposed) nor did he intend to teach a baptismal (conditional) justification. We do not have to speculate here.

One of the distinctive errors of the self-described Federal Vision theology is the doctrine that, in baptism, all the benefits of the covenant of grace are conferred temporarily and conditionally.¹ Thus, they claim, there is such a thing as a “covenantal” (temporary, conditional) election, justification, adoption etc. This system of parallel benefits (temporary and actual) leveraged by baptism results in a de facto Arminianism or even Romanism: that which is given in baptism may be lost without sufficient cooperation with the grace given. After the category of covenant has been invoked these writers speak in the same way the Remonstrants did. In 1980, a number of Orthodox Presbyterian ministers and theologians noted the connection between Arminian theology and that of the father of the Federal Vision theology, Norman Shepherd. They wrote, “The statements cited show a tendency to use typically Calvinistic language with respect to the level of God’s secret will, but in the level of “covenant perspective” to use typically Arminian language (Christ died for you; the elect may become reprobate).” In 2010, Chris Gordon observed the connection between the Remonstrants and the FV.²

One of the distinctive rhetorical tactics of the Federal Visionists is to quote an orthodox author saying something that seems heterodox. It is a rhetorical box trap. When an earnest orthodox fellow takes the bait, by criticizing the orthodox author quoted, the Federal Visionist pulls the string and down comes the box on the prey: “Aha! You have condemned an orthodox writer!” The gentle reader will note that, in contrast to this tactic, it is the practice of the HB to quote sources carefully and in context with citations so that the reader can follow the bread crumbs back to the original source.³ Ad fontes! To be sure, not everyone who sets such a rhetorical box trap is a Federal Visionist but in this age of instant internet scholarship, it is perhaps more important than ever to be sure to read sources in their original context. In doing historical theology, the internet can be a something like Lombard’s Sentences, which was a collection of quotations from original sources, but they were not all authentic nor were they placed in context. The Renaissance humanists and the Reformers eschewed such compilations in favor of original sources (read in the original languages). Quotations are important and useful but context is essential.

Recently, I was alerted to one of such box trap. The bait is a quotation from a work by Herman Witsius (1636–1708), “On the Efficacy and Utility of Baptism in the Case of Elect Infants Whose Parents Are Under the Covenant” (1693). It first appeared in English as an appendix to William Marshall, Popery in the Full Corn, the Ear, and the Blade; or the Doctrine of Baptism in the Romish, Episcopalian, and Congregational Churches with a Defence of the Calvinistic or Presbyterian View (Edinburgh, 1852). In 2006, Mark Beach published a new and revised edition of this work in the Mid-America Journal of Theology. ⁴  The quotation in question says:

There are not wanting, I admit, theologians even of the highest name who give a somewhat different account of these matters, maintaining that a certain kind of regeneration and justification is not only signified but bestowed upon all the infants of covenanted persons without exception, although it may not be infallibly connected with salvation inasmuch as they may fall from it by their own sin after they have grown up.

The passage comes at the beginning of section (hereafter §) VII (p. 132). At first glance it might seem to say the same sorts of things that the Federal Visionists have been advocating since 1974, that there is a “certain kind of regeneration and justification…bestowed upon all” baptized infants of such a kind that may be lost. Indeed, Witsius quoted David Pareus (1548–1622), the editor of Ursinus’ lectures on the Heidelberg Catechism, and an ecumenical theologian who sought to unite the Lutheran and Reformed churches in the early 17th century in the Palatinate, as teaching something like this. Mark Beach, the editor of the modern edition, was unable to verify Witsius’ quotation of Pareus but let us proceed as if Witsius got the quotation correct. He also cites a certain Robert Baron, a seventeenth-century theologian in Aberdeen, John Forbes (1593–1648), also a theologian in Aberdeen, who defended the anti-Reformed “Articles of Perth,” Augustine (354–430), and Prosper of Aquitaine (c. 390–c.455) as holding similar views. He quotes Forbes at length advocating this view.⁵ Witsius also quoted John Davenant (1572–1641), the Anglican Bishop of Salisbury and a delegate to the Synod of Dort—long a favorite of the Federal Visionists—(§ VIII; pp. 133–34), who argued that infants are granted in baptism a “peculiar justification, regeneration, and sanctification,” which, “although it suffices for the salvation of children, he does not regard it as sufficient for adults” (p. 134).

The question is whether Witsius quoted these pre-Reformation (e.g. Augustine and Prosper) theologians and these colorful and arguably idiosyncratic seventeenth-century theologians to agree with them? Let us keep reading. In § X Witsius revealed his own view. He commended the writers summarized and quoted as an acute” and “learned” but he also wrote:

To me, however, if I may be allowed to give an opinion, they seem not altogether sound; and indeed, the whole of these excellent men come to this: that while they get rid of certain difficulties, they involve themselves in others not less serious (p. 134).

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