R. L. Dabney (1820–1898) on the Double Payment Fallacy

Nor would we attach any force to the argument, that if Christ made penal satisfaction for the sins of all, justice would forbid any to be punished. To urge this argument surrenders virtually the very ground on which the first Socinian objection was refuted, and is incompatible with the facts that God chastises justified believers, and holds elect unbelievers subject to wrath till they believe. Christ’s satisfaction is not a pecuniary equivalent; but only such a one as enables the Father, consistently with His attributes, to pardon, if in His mercy He sees fit. The whole avails of the satisfaction to a given man is suspended on His belief. There would be no injustice to the man, if he remaining an unbeliever, his guilt were punished twice over, first in his Saviour, and then in Him. See Hodge on Atonement, page 369.

R. L. Dabney, Syllabus and Notes of the Course of Systematic and Polemic Theology, Second Edition (Presbyterian Publishing Company, 1878), 521.

Related to this argument, Dabney said:

15. Is Justification by Grace Licentious in Tendency?

We have reserved to the close the discussion of the objection, that this doctrine of justification, by faith on Christ’s righteousness, tends to loosen the bonds of the moral law. There are two parties who suggest this idea—the legalists, who urge it as an unavoidable objection to our doctrine; and the Antinomians, who accept it as a just consequence of the doctrine. Both classes may be dealt with together, except as to one point growing out of the assertion that Christ fulfilled the preceptive, as well as bore the penal law in our stead. If this be so, says the Antinomian, how can God exact obedience of the believer, as an essential of the Christian state, without committing the unrighteousness of demanding payment of the same debt twice over? I reply, that it is not a pecuniary, but a moral debt. In explaining the doctrine of substitution, I showed that God’s acceptance of our Surety’s work in our room was wholly an optional and gracious act with Him, because Christ’s vicarious work, however well adapted to satisfy the law in our stead, did not necessarily and naturally extinguish the claims of the law on us; was not a “legal tender,” in such sense that God was obliged either to take that, or lose all claims. Now, as God’s accepting the substitutionary righteousness at all was an act of mere grace, the extent to which He shall accept it depends on His mere will. And it can release us no farther than He graciously pleases to allow. Hence, if He tells us, as He does, that He does not so accept it, as to release us from the law as a rule of living, there is no injustice.

Dabney, Systematic and Polemic Theology, 648.

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Thomas Watson (1620–1686) on the Sufficiency and Efficiency of Christ’s Death

Obj. It is said, Christ died for all; “‘he is the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world,” John i. 29., how doth this consist with God’s truth, when some are vessels of wrath, Rom. ix. 22.”

Ans. 1. We must distinguish of world. The word is taken either in a limited sense, for the world of the elect; or in a larger sense, for both elect and reprobates. “Christ takes away the sins of the world,” that is, the world of the elect.

A. 2. We must distinguish of Christ’s dying for the world. Christ died sufficiently for all, not effectually. There is the value of Christ’s blood, and the virtue; Christ’s blood hath value enough to redeem the whole world, but the virtue of it is applied only to such as believe. Christ’s blood is meritorious for all, not efficacious. All are not saved, because some put away salvation from them, Acts xiii. 46., and vilify Christ’s blood, counting it an unholy thing, Heb. x. 29.

Thomas Watson, “A Body of Practical Divinity,” in The Select Works of Thomas Watson (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1855), 71–72; some reformatting.

Note: Watson’s language either reflects the classical construction or it represents a transitional category. The determinant will be the meaning of his language of “dying for all” as to the sufficiency, and Christ’s blood is “meritorious for all” (which clearly does not reflect the revised construction), and his wider theological statements. For now I will will list him in the classical category.

“The cross,” saith Austin [Augustine], “was a pulpit, in which Christ preached his love to the world.” That Christ should die, was more than if all the angels had been turned to dust; and that Christ should die as a malefactor, having the weight of all men’s sins laid upon him, that he should die for his enemies, Rom. 5:10. The balm-tree weeps out its precious balm, to heal those that cut and mangle it: Christ shed his blood, to heal those that crucified him.

Thomas Watson, The Select Works of the Rev. Thomas Watson, Comprising His Celebrated Body of Divinity, in a Series of Lectures on the Shorter Catechism, and Various Sermons and Treatises (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1855), 119.

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