Ambrosiaster On Justification By Faith Alone In His Commentaries On The Pauline Epistles

By Dongsun Cho

[Dongsun Cho is Assistant Professor of Historical Theology at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Tex.]

I. Introduction

Both Catholics and many Protestants have traditionally assumed that the idea of justification by faith alone was alien to the church fathers.[1] In particular, Protestants such as T. F. Torrance and Maurice Wiles were skeptical about the continuity between first-century Christianity and second-century Christianity on justification by faith.[2] Alister McGrath supposed that Augustine might be the first patristic writer who presented at least a meaningful discussion of the role of faith in justification.[3] The difference between Catholics and Protestants in this assumption is that the former group sees sola fide as a theological invention of Lutherans and other sixteenth-century Protestants, and the latter takes it as the recovery of the Pauline doctrine of justification.

However, some Protestants have recently begun to realize that the doctrine of justification by faith alone had not been lost since the NT era. Thomas Oden refutes the argument that the church fathers completely forgot Paul’s doctrine of justification by faith alone, and shows how many church fathers faithfully held the evangelical doctrine of justification. He maintains that to speak of the sudden disappearance of the doctrine of justification by faith alone is “an intemperate idea” and “neglectful” “of many ancient consensus-bearing texts.”[4] In a similar spirit, Daniel H. Williams asserts that “not only is such a view anachronistic and tends to assume that there was (or is) a uniform definition of justification, but there is evidence that Latin theology before Augustine promulgated the tenets of unmerited grace” and “the imputation of the righteousness of God.”[5] Nick Needham also attests to the stream of a patristic understanding of justification by faith alone by presenting “the evidence for justification language bearing a forensic meaning” and the equation of justification with “forgiveness, remission, pardon, or acquittal” in patristic literature.[6]

Refuting McGrath’s skepticism about a patristic tradition of sola fide, therefore, Oden, Williams, and Needham all confirm that many church fathers prior to Augustine maintained the evangelical understanding of justification by faith alone as an important, if not the central, theme of Christian soteriology.[7] One may wonder which ancient fathers expounded an understanding of justification by faith alone. Oden, Williams, and Needham recognize that several, if not all, second- and third-century patristic writers made their occasional confirmation of sola fide, but the three contemporary scholars commonly find more clear and detailed discussions of sola fide among the fourth-century fathers. The appearance of Pauline commentary works in that century definitely led theologians to sharpen their understanding of sola fide. For Oden, Origen, John Chrysostom, and Theodoret of Cyrrhus in the East and Clement of Rome, Augustine, Prosper, and Fulgentius in the West are “leading” ancient writers who show “patristic anticipations of Reformation teaching on justification.”[8] For Williams, Hilary of Poitiers’s commentary on Matthew reflects Paul’s idea of sola fide “prominently” even before Augustine.[9] For Needham, John Chrysostom in the East and Jerome and Ambrose in the West display their keen awareness of the absolute necessity of faith, apart from works, as the ground of justification.

II. Survey Of Scholarship On Ambrosiaster On The Doctrine Of Justification

Despite the above three Protestant scholars’ lack of acknowledgment of Ambrosiaster’s contribution to a patristic doctrine of justification by faith alone, I argue that whoever wants to study further in that subject needs to give more substantial attention to Ambrosiaster. In the late fourth century he was the first Latin patristic exegete to produce a commentary on the entire Pauline corpus. He was the earliest Latin father to use not only the concept but also the actual term sola fide more frequently than any patristic writer. Recent scholarship on Ambrosiaster views him as a Roman clergyman whose ministry was active during the time of Pope Damascus and showed his mature understanding of his contemporary Judaism. Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentary was a theological reaction against another patristic perspective highlighting the Jewishness of Paul rather than his break with Judaism.[10] In a study of patristic scholarship on Paul’s theology, Wiles asserts that Ambrosiaster may be “the most important” exegete of all Latin church fathers.[11] Ambrosiaster’s doctrine of original sin influenced Augustine. Pelagius appreciated Ambrosiaster’s emphasis on free will. Medieval exegetes regarded Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentaries as Ambrose’s works and used them as a reliable authority on many issues. In spite of his considerable influence upon the historical development of later Latin biblical exegesis, however, “of all the later Latin Fathers, Ambrosiaster is perhaps the most neglected and in need of further study.”[12] In regards to our subject matter, the theme of justification is not an incidental part but “fundamental” to Ambrosiaster’s soteriology.[13]

As a matter of fact, Oden, Williams, and Needham are not unaware of Ambrosiaster’s teaching of sola fide. Oden cites several of Ambrosiaster’s references to sola fide although he does not analyze them theologically. Williams makes a very insightful but too brief comment on him. For Needham, Ambrosiaster is only an incidental reference in a footnote. Ambrosiaster is not a favorite patristic writer of Oden or Williams or Needham in their apologies for the ancient Christian writers’ teaching of sola fide.

Surprisingly, however, Martin Chemnitz, a sixteenth-century Lutheran patristic scholar, already recognized the value of Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentaries as “the best” Latin patristic works that “speak most accurately about justification” before Augustine.[14] Fortunately, Chemnitz is not alone in his high view of Ambrosiaster’s contribution to the legacy of a patristic doctrine of sola fide. The book Reading Romans Through the Centuries: From the Early Church to Karl Barth (2005) chose Ambrosiaster as the representative Latin writer who preserved the Pauline doctrine of sola fide prior to Augustine. Gerald L. Bray was the writer of that chapter and claimed in it, “Ambrosiaster is clearer and more detailed than any patristic writer” in the Latin church prior to Augustine in the matter of justification by faith alone.[15] Ambrosiaster explained the legal aspects of justification in terms of guilt and imputation.

Chemnitz’s and Bray’s reports of Ambrosiaster’s understanding of sola fide are not without challenges from both Protestant and especially Catholic readers of Ambrosiaster. Alexander Souter, who had already laid a foundational work for modern scholarship on Ambrosiaster through his earlier book A Study of Ambrosiaster (1905), criticized the Latin father for teaching justification based on works. Since his critiques significantly influenced later scholars’ refusal to recognize Ambrosiaster’s evangelical view of sola fide, it is worth noting what this Scottish Protestant patristic scholar stated concerning Ambrosiaster’s doctrine of justification:

He is relatively nearer to Pelagius than to Augustine. He has not grasped the idea that before God man must always be the receiver and the favored, never giver or benefactor. Ambrosiaster, like many another, is obsessed by the idea that we can acquire merit with God, and the associated idea that certain labours on our part are necessary to gain it. By fides Ambrosiaster understands (in 1 Cor.) the facts forming the content of belief, and not the belief itself. The ‘righteousness of God’ is shown in His keeping of his promise, but in Rom. iii. [Ambrosiaster] very acutely seems to identify it with ‘mercy’. . . . He does not really understand the doctrine of justification by faith, as is clear from his comment that only fides can establish a meritum (in Rom; iv).[16]

McGrath uncritically embraces Souter’s accusation of Ambrosiaster’s anticipation of Pelagianism and a restricted notion of the righteousness of God as God’s own faithfulness in keeping his promise rather than as the imputed righteousness of Christ.[17] Catholic patristic scholar Quasten argues, “Ambrosiaster assigns a considerable value to man’s self-determination and his free will, and makes him the author of his own destiny.”[18] For Ambrosiaster, the works of the law do not refer to obedience of the moral law but to the observation of the ritual law such as circumcision or Sabbaths. Therefore, justification by faith alone apart from the works of the law simply means that the forgiveness of sins is not by observing the ceremonial regulations of the law. Based on Quasten’s arguments, another Catholic writer, Robert B. Eno, also claims that Ambrosiaster used “faith alone” only as related to initial justification (forgiveness of sins), not to ultimate and eschatological justification to be rewarded by good works.[19] Whether a Christian could remain justified continually and grow in justification depends on good works. Eno also interprets Ambrosiaster’s emphasis on works in a very typical Catholic sense. In other words, according to the Roman exegete, the justifying faith in the ultimate sense is not faith alone but faith alone that is working through “brotherly love for the perfection of the believer.”[20]

Unfortunately, Bray and other Protestant scholars who have defended Ambrosiaster’s Reformational teaching on justification have not yet responded to the challenges from Souter, Quasten, and particularly Eno. In order to provide responsible answers to the challenges related to Ambrosiaster’s evangelical understanding of justification, we need to clarify Ambrosiaster’s usage of the phrase sola fide apart from the works of the law, justification before God as distinct from justification before the world, the legal aspects of justification (guilt and imputation), the role of works, and the concept of merit in justification. In the remainder of this article, I will attempt to show that Ambrosiaster virtually anticipated the Reformation understanding of justification by faith alone although he might have stressed the unity between faith as the way of justification and good works as an inevitable evidence of justification more than the Reformers.

III. Interpretation Of Sola Fide In Ambrosiaster’s Pauline Commentaries

1. Sola Fide Sine Operibus Legis

Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentaries are replete with the phrase sola fide almost whenever Paul speaks of justification:

Rom 3:24 “They [believers] are justified freely, neither because they have labored nor because they have made a repayment, but by faith alone they are justified by the gift of God.” 

Rom 4:5 “Therefore, how do the Jews think that they were justified by the works of the law in the same way as Abraham, seeing that Abraham was not justified by the works of the law, but by faith alone? Therefore, there is no need of the law, since the ungodly person is justified before God by faith alone.” 

Rom 9:28 “Faith alone is laid for salvation.” 

Rom 11:32 “God would set only faith by which all sins may be abolished.”[21]

No one could miss the crystal clear contrast between faith alone and the works of the law in the matter of justification. Neither could one fail to recognize Ambrosiaster’s rejection of any positive value of the works of the law for man to be justified before God. Protestant readers might be excited about the historical fact that the phrase sola fide is not Luther’s own innovation but that Luther could have inherited a patristic tradition of justification by faith alone. Hans Küng concurs that the phrase sola fide is not the Reformers’ invention but belongs to the patristic tradition found among “Origen, Hilary, Basil, Chrysosotom, Augustine, Cyril of Alexandria and especially Ambrosiaster and Bernard.”[22] Küng rightly observes that the issue between Catholics and Protestants must be “not the formula itself but the meaning of the formula.”[23]

Unsurprisingly, Catholics do not accept Ambrosiaster’s phrase sola fide as evidence of his evangelical understanding of justification by faith alone. Quasten does not deny that Ambrosiaster actually used the phrase sola fide sine operibus legis (by faith only without the works of the law) in his discussion of justification. According to Quasten, however, Ambrosiaster’s phrase simply means that “the ritual practices of the Law such as Sabbath, circumcision, new moons, dietary laws, etc.)” are no longer necessary in justification after the coming of Christ.[24] Ambrosiaster never intends to deny the necessity of good works as an essential element to justification. Indeed, Ambrosiaster’s expositions on Rom 3:28, 4:1, and 9:28 show that he interprets the meaning of sola fide sine operibus legis as Paul’s rejection of the observation of the ritual. Eno construes Ambrosiaster’s sine operibus legis in light of the social and religious exclusivism of first-century Judaism. Since the Jews’ cultural and ethnic pride shown in their emphasis on circumcision and dietary regulations prevented Gentile believers from enjoying full membership in the church, Paul had to pinpoint the importance of faith.[25] Therefore, Ambrosiaster’s point is to show that, contrary to the Judaizers’ arguments, the believing Gentiles must be justified by faith without observing the law of circumcision and other ritual regulations. Like Quasten, therefore, Eno maintains that what Ambrosiaster denies in relation to justification is not good works but the observation of the Jewish ritual laws. Based on Ambrosiaster’s emphasis on the need for good works, a topic which we will examine later in this article, Eno defines the ancient father’s sola fide as “faith alone in love,” in other words, faith in Jesus as the promised Messiah and also works produced by that faith.[26] Papsdorf is also certain that Ambrosiaster’s theology of sola fide does not resonate with Luther’s, and faith, united with baptism and meritorious acts, makes someone a truly justified believer.[27]

However, does Ambrosiaster’s reference to the Jewish ceremonial law as the works of the law have to mean necessarily that he admits good works as an inevitable condition for justification? The critical question we have to ask is not about whether Ambrosiaster’s sola fide intends to exclude the Jewish ritual regulations as a necessary channel by which man is justified. Instead, the question must be about whether Ambrosiaster ever argues that the exclusion of the ceremonial laws is all that Paul meant by his argument that there is no salvation by the works of the law.

The entire corpus of Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentaries demonstrates that not only the ceremonial law but the moral law, that is, meritorious works, are neither instrumental in nor causative of justification. Abraham’s sola fide shows that not only the ceremonial law but also moral sanctity to avoid evil does not contribute anything to his justification: “It [Scripture] revealed that Abraham had glory before God not because he was circumcised, or because he abstained himself from evil, but because he believed in God.”[28] In his exegesis of Rom 3:24, Ambrosiaster also states, “They [believers] are justified freely, neither because they have labored nor because they have made a repayment, but by faith alone they are justified by the gift of God.”[29] Not only pre- but also post-justification merits cannot cause believers to be justified. Ambrosiaster clarifies further, “It is absolute that merit is not imputed as a reward to the man who is subject either to the law of works [the ritual law], that is, of Moses, or to the law of nature [the moral law], so that he might have glory before God.”[30] Ambrosiaster’s comment on Rom 4:7–8 substantially attests to his idea that sola fide has no room for good works in his doctrine of justification: “They are explicitly blessed, whose iniquities are forgiven without any labor or work and whose sins are covered without any work of penitence being required of them, only if they believe.”[31] The forgiveness of sins results from faith alone apart from any kind of works of the law, even including the works of penitence. Citing Deut 27:26, Paul declares in Gal 3:10 that whoever is under the law is cursed whether he is under the ceremonial law or the moral law, because the law of God requires us to obey all its requests. Ambrosiaster laments, “The [moral] commandments are so great that it is impossible to keep them.”[32]

2. Forensic Justification

Despite Eno’s claims, Ambrosiaster does display antagonism against the thought that good works are a legitimate constituent of justification. Ambrosiaster affirms, “The gospel established them [believers] in the faith of Christ alone and justified them more or less in opposition to the law, not by destroying it but by showing that Christianity was superior.”[33] The reason Ambrosiaster does not trust in any human merit in justification is that human nature is too weak and sinful to obey all the precepts and commandments of the law. The law “was given in order to show that those who sinned against it were guilty before God, . . . but because of the weakness of its infirmity the human race was not able to restrain itself from sins, and was made liable to the death of hell.”[34] Man cannot obey the law because his nature is in bondage either to his own sins or his inherited sins.[35] Therefore, sinners who cannot keep the law are not only “guilty [reos]” but also “slaves of sin [servi peccati].”[36]

Due to the impossibility of perfect observation of the law, faith was given to us so that we could believe in Christ who himself is “the perfection of the law [perfectionem legis]” by “making a satisfaction of the total law for everyone who transgresses [omnibus praetermissis fides satisfaceret pro tota lege].”[37] On the cross, Christ accomplished a divine satisfaction to God on our behalf that we could not have done because of our weak and sinful nature. Since he fulfilled all the requirements of the law through his vicarious death, he could liberate us who had been previously held as guilty from legal obligation to keep the law.

Here Ambrosiaster takes a legal approach to justification. Augustine explains the process of justification as if it were a healing process from a spiritual disease. The grace of God for the justification of believers is, according to the bishop of Hippo, God’s powerful medicine to cure the sinful human nature. In contrast, Ambrosiaster does not use medical process imagery in his exegesis of justification. Bray’s summary of a difference between other ancient fathers and Ambrosiaster concerning the nature of sin is very insightful: “Where other ancient writers tend to think in intellectual terms, and regard the sinful state of fallen man as confusion and blindness, Ambrosiaster prefers to speak of guilt, of which the sinner is fully aware and for which he alone is responsible.”[38] He describes justification as a legal liberation from two things. First, justification liberates believing sinners from their legal obligation to “pay off their debts to God” who is the divine judge.[39] Those who believe in Christ receive mercy, not wrath, from God.[40] In his body, Christ “destroyed the certificate of debt which had been decreed by the sin of Adam.”[41] Second, justification liberates believing sinners from the penalty of eternal punishment immediately and completely when they believe in the promised Messiah.[42] Therefore, his name is “the liberator [liberatori].”[43] Whoever wants to be justified by keeping the law after conversion will lose the grace of God in Christ because that attitude rejects justification by faith as “the gift of God.”[44]

“Faith alone” in Christ brought to an end the mandate to keep both the ritual law and the moral law as a way of justification. All this legal liberation and justification occur only by faith.[45] Although Ambrosiaster does not explicitly expound the role of faith in the union between Christ and believers, all his arguments presuppose it. In his comment on Gal 1:4 Ambrosiaster refers to union with Christ by faith in an indirect way: “But Christ not only made us alive again but also united us to himself by forgiving our sins so that we would be called the sons of God by faith.”[46] Ambrosiaster relates forgiveness, rather than faith itself, to union with Christ. However, to argue that union is possible only by faith is not to read a Reformational thought into this ancient commentator’s writing because for him forgiveness is only by faith alone.[47]

3. The Role Of Good Works In Justification

What then is the role of good works if they are neither instrumental in nor causative of justification? Good works are necessary in order to accomplish sanctification, which is distinct from justification in Ambrosiaster’s thought. After reminding his readers that “by God they were freely justified from wickedness,” Ambrosiaster points to sanctification as the ultimate purpose of justification by faith and as a proof of genuine salvation:

For this purpose [sanctification], we are washed by the gift of God, so that from henceforth we should provoke the love of God in us, while living pure life, not making the work of grace in vain. . . . Since by the gift of God men have been purified and liberated from the second death, they ought to offer a living sacrifice so that it may be a proof [signum] of eternal life.[48]

Ambrosiaster’s considerable emphasis on good works as an evidence of justification or salvation explains well why he underscores the unity of faith and works. With regard to faith working through love in Gal 5:6, he states, “Faith must be strengthened by brotherly love so that the one who believes may be perfect.”[49] Here Ambrosiaster does not mean the insufficiency of faith in justification but issues a warning to a false Christianity that produces nominal Christians. Calvin’s exegesis of Gal 5:6 seems to clarify what Ambrosiaster understands regarding faith working through love:

It is not our doctrine that the faith which justifies is alone; we maintain that it is invariably accompanied by good works; only we contend that faith alone is sufficient for justification. . . . He [Paul] points out what are the true exercises of believers. . . . Paul does not here treat of justification, or assign any part of the praise of it to love. Had he done so, the same argument would prove that circumcision and ceremonies, at a former period, had some share in justifying a sinner.[50]

Although Eno presents Ambrosiaster as a good Catholic who teaches that we will be justified in accordance with our good works, this is exactly what Ambrosiaster tries to refute throughout his entire commentaries. Williams summarizes very well the relationship between faith and works in Ambrosiaster: “By faith alone one is freely forgiven of all sins and the believer is no longer burdened by the Law for meriting good works. Our works, however, are demonstrative of our faith and will determine whether we are ultimately justified; faith is also the first good work that begins the process of justification and sanctification.”[51]

Since justification does not depend on our post-conversion merits, Christians’ efforts to be perfect do not necessitate a Catholic idea of progressive justification through good works. In Phil 2:1–4, Paul encourages the church at Philippi to act based on mutual love and humility in order to be perfect. The apostle relates their being perfect to their being “seen approved by other people [in ceteris probati videantur],” not to their justification before God: “If they are not guarding these things [pious actions], they would not be seen approved by others, so that they do not want to be seen disapproved by others, let them also keep them, then they will be perfect.”[52]

Perfection by keeping the moral law or being approved by people refers to the “temporal righteousness” that people recognize in the world, not to the “eternal righteousness” that only God proclaims based on faith.[53] Temporal righteousness leads to “justification before the world by keeping the law” since people praise the doers of the law and reward them in this present world. If someone does not observe the moral law in the world, there will be a punishment for that person because he is not righteous before the eyes of men. If he keeps the law, he is considered as “justified for now [iustificatur ad praesens]” by the world and could have “glory but not before God, yet before the world [gloriam, sed non apud deum, sed apud mundum].”[54] However, justification before the world does not enable the doers of the moral law to pass the righteous judgment of God at the eschaton because there is no one who can keep the law perfectly. In contrast, eternal righteousness by faith leads to justification before God.[55]

4. Imputed Righteousness In Justification

What is the nature of righteousness that enables believers to stand before God eternally although they are not able to keep the law perfectly? Here Ambrosiaster encourages his audience to rely on the righteousness that is not earned by good works but imputed by faith alone.[56] Long before Luther, Ambrosiaster understood the importance of imputed righteousness by faith alone, not by merit. Paul teaches that righteousness was “imputed” to Abraham “not by the work [works] of the law, but by faith.”[57] When interpreting Rom 4:8, Ambrosiaster identifies the forgiveness, cover, and non-imputation of sins as the one and same reality because all three things are received in the one and same way: “When he covers he forgives, and when he forgives, he does not impute [sins]. . . . Without any labor or work sins are forgiven and covered and not imputed [to sinners] by washing [baptism].[58] “Sins would not be imputed to those who accept the faith of Christ” because Christ already satisfied all the requirements of the law on the cross and, consequently, liberated believers, who are united with him.[59] Ambrosiaster preserves remarkably well the Pauline doctrine of imputation between Christ and sinners.

5. Merit And Justification

Unlike other themes related to justification, Ambrosiaster’s readers might not be able to construct a clear picture of his usage of the term “merit.” In spite of his strong rejection of good works as a causative element to justification, he sometimes speaks of the merit of justification or the positive role of merit in preparing for divine judgment:

Gal 3:12 “But if he wants to be justified before God, so that it may profit him according to merit in the day of judgment, let him follow the faith of God.” 

Phil 2:13 “Good conduct works salvation.” 

Phil 3:12 “How much more shall they understand that they have to work in order to obtain the merits of justification.” 

Phil 4:2 “Paul announces all [Euodia and Syntyche] to be considered in the book of life because of the merit of their faith.”[60]

Does Ambrosiaster teach a Tridentine doctrine of merit? The Council of Trent “explains that a man can merit eternal life. . . . It is at once a gift of God and a reward for good [meritorious] works.”[61] The theologians of Trent understood that meritorious good works give Christians the right to claim their rewards of eternal life based on the justice of God who “has promised to accept man’s works.”[62] At first glance, the above-mentioned statements of Ambrosiaster seem to support a theological continuity between Ambrosiaster and the Council of Trent. However, there are some solid reasons why we should not think so. First, Ambrosiaster does not speak of merits when he discusses strictly the role of good works in justification before God who imputes eternal righteousness to believers by faith alone. Therefore, we cannot find a clear reference to merit with regard to justification in his commentary on Romans where he elaborates on the issue of justification. Second, his comments on merits in 1 Cor 15:41, 2 Cor 4:14, and Phil 3:11 all speak of the different glories as heavenly rewards that all believers will have in the day of resurrection, not of the different eternal destinies of believers. Third, the term “merit” always occurs in the context of sanctification even when the word appears along with justification as in Phil 3:12. Fourth, it is not plausible to assume that Ambrosiaster is so inconsistent in his theology of justification. For instance, Ambrosiaster emphatically asserts in 2 Tim 1:9, “God predestined that they should be revived, at what time and through whom and in what way they can be saved, so that they might be saved neither by the merit of those who were saved nor by the merit of those through whom they were called, but this gift [salvation] is seen to be granted by the grace of God through the faith of Christ.”[63] We must interpret Ambrosiaster’s usage of the term “merit” not from a linguistic analysis but from his entire theology of justification and the broad context of a passage where that word appears.

Unlike Luther and Oecolampadius, some Reformers such as Melanchthon and the contributors to the Augsburg Confession admitted the temporal value of merits in this present world or even in the age to come.[64] Nevertheless, those Reformers who admitted a positive function of Christians’ merits rejected the Catholic belief in a right to claim eternal life as their legitimate reward. Merits please God not because they are free from sin but because he himself commanded good works as evidence of justification. Ambrosiaster’s idea of merit would be closer to that of Melanchthon than to Luther without yielding to the Catholic doctrine of condign merit.

After reviewing especially Ambrose’s and Jerome’s usages of the term “merit,” Needham maintains that we do not need to accept merits as an inevitable theological reference to “some quid pro quo human claim on God” when these fathers consistently denounce good works as the ground of justification in their writings.[65]

We could apply Needham’s conclusion to Ambrosiaster since he likewise renounces the idea that justification takes place in accordance with merits before and after believing in Jesus Christ, who himself is the perfect satisfaction of the law.

IV. Conclusion

Ambrosiaster’s understanding of justification shows that the doctrine of sola fide did not disappear after first-century NT Christianity. There is a significant theological consensus between Ambrosiaster and the Reformers on justification: the gratuitousness of grace, the rejection of good works as a necessary constituent of justification, and a distinction between justification and sanctification. Furthermore, Ambrosiaster displays his keen awareness of the theological importance of imputed righteousness by faith alone. His strong stress on sola fide does not weaken or ignore another truth of the necessity of holiness in a Christian’s life. For him, good works operate as evidence of true faith rather than as a necessary merit for eschatological justification. Concerning the idea of merit in the theology of Ambrosiaster, it is safe to say that Ambrosiaster uses the idea of merit in order to strengthen the inseparability between justification and sanctification in the Christian life. An apparently different aspect between Ambrosiaster and the Reformers is that the former does not discuss the “declarative” element of justification in spite of his emphasis on imputed righteousness. One possible explanation would be that he was much concerned about the genuineness of the justified Christian identity and truly believed that every justified Christian must be made righteous before the eyes of people in the world.

Two issues in Ambrosiaster’s doctrine of justification deserve further research. One is to find the source (or sources) of Ambrosiaster’s view of justification by faith alone in the Latin tradition. The other area is the relationship between predestination and justification. Although Williams denies any consequential link between predestination and justification in Ambrosiaster, this Latin exegete does use the doctrine of predestination in order to remove any human pride in the matter of justification, as we see in his comment on 2 Tim 1:9.[66] This issue would also help scholars of Ambrosiaster and Augustine determine how much Ambrosiaster influenced Augustine in the latter’s understanding of predestination and justification.

Notes

1. For a Catholic perspective see Robert B. Eno, “Some Patristic Views on the Relationship of Faith and Works in Justification,” in Justification by Faith: Lutherans and Catholics in Dialogue VII (ed. H. George Anderson, T. Austin Murphy, and Joseph A. Burgess; Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1985), 111-30. For a Protestant perspective see Bengt Hägglund, History of Theology (trans. Gene J. Lund; St. Louis: Concordia, 1966), 17; F. Hildebrandt, Christianity According to the Wesleys (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1997), 18; Eberhard Jüngel, Justification: The Heart of the Christian Faith (trans. J. F. Cayzer; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2001), 70-73.
2. T. F. Torrance, The Doctrine of Grace in the Apostolic Fathers (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1959), 44; Maurice Wiles, The Divine Apostle: The Interpretation of Paul’s Epistles in the Early Church (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967), 134-35.
3. Alister McGrath, Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification (2d ed.; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 23. For McGrath, Ambrosiaster presents justification as freedom from “the Jewish ceremonial law,” not from “a law of works” (ibid., 22).
4. Thomas Oden, The Justification Reader (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), 16.
5. Daniel H. Williams, “Justification by Faith: A Patristic Doctrine,” JEH 57 (2006): 649.
6. Nick Needham, “Justification in the Early Church Fathers,” in Justification in Perspective: Historical Developments and Contemporary Challenges (ed. Bruce L. McCormack; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2006): 29-30.
7. Oden, Justification, 15-26; Williams, “Justification by Faith,” 651-53; Needham, “Justification in the Early Church Fathers,” 25-54. These three scholars’ consensus on the existence of sola fide among the church fathers prior to Augustine does not necessarily mean that they always agree with one another in evaluating individual patristic writers.
8. Oden, Justification, 44-45.
9. Williams, “Justification by Faith,” 657.
10. Andrew S. Jacobs, “A Jew’s Jew: Paul and the Early Christian Problem of Jewish Origins,” JR 86 (2006): 258-86. Jacobs names Jerome, Cyril of Alexandria, John Chrysostom, and Eusebius of Caesarea as the patristic writers who emphasized the Jewish heritage of Christianity more than the contrast between two faiths.
11. Wiles, Divine Apostle, 11.
12. David G. Hunter, “Fourth-Century Latin Writers: Hilary, Victorinus, Ambrosiaster, Ambrose,” in The Cambridge History of Early Christian Literature (ed. Frances Young, Lewis Ayres, and Andrew Louth; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 309.
13. Johannes Quasten, The Golden Age of Latin Patristic Literature (vol. 4 of Patrology; 4 vols.; Notre Dame, Ind.: Christian Classics, 1986), 188.
14. Martin Chemnitz, Loci Theologici (trans. Jacob A. O. Preus; 2 vols.; St. Louis: Concordia, 1989), 1:32a. Although aware of Erasmus’s critical conclusion that the allegedly Ambrosian Pauline commentaries did not belong to the bishop of Milan, Chemnitz did not stop calling Ambrosiaster “Ambrose” for a polemical reason. Chemnitz might have intentionally placed the whole of Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentary under the name of Ambrose because that respected name added even further weight to “the polemical value of the commentary and its many fine statements on justification by faith” in order to refute the Catholic doctrine of justification by faith and works. See Carl L. Beckwith, “Martin Chemnitz’s Reading of the Fathers in Oratione de Lectione Patrum,” CTQ 73 (2009): 248.
15. Gerald L. Bray, “Ambrosiaster,” in Reading Romans Through the Centuries: From the Early Church to Karl Barth (ed. Jeffrey P. Greenman and Timothy Larsen; Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2005), 25. It may come as no surprise that Bray produced the first English translation of Ambrosiaster’s Pauline commentaries in 2009. The absence of an English translation of Ambrosiaster might have been the hindrance that kept English-speaking Protestant scholars from doing further research on his view of justification by faith alone. I am greatly indebted to Bray for his translation of Ambrosiaster’s Commentaries on Romans and 1-2 Corinthians (Ancient Christian Texts; Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2009) and his translation of Ambrosiaster’s Commentaries on Galatians–Philemon (Ancient Christian Texts; Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2009) for some of the translations herein.
16. Alexander Souter, The Earliest Latin Commentaries on the Epistles of St. Paul (Oxford: Clarendon, 1927), 80.
17. McGrath, Iustitia Dei, 22, 52.
18. Quasten, Golden Age of Latin Patristic Literature,188-89.
19. Robert B. Eno, “Some Patristic Views,” 116-17.
20. Ibid., 116.
21. Rom 3:24 (Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum 81/1αβ:118. Hereafter CSEL): Iustificati sunt gratis, quia nihil operantes neque vicem reddentes sola fide iustificati sunt dono dei; Rom 4:5 (CSEL 81/1γ:131): quomodo ergo Iudaei per opera legis iustificari se putant iustificatione Abrahae, videntes Abraham non opera legis, sed sola fide iustifcatum? Non ergo opus est lege, quando inpius sola fide iustificatur apud deum; Rom 9:28 (CSEL 81/1γ:333): sola fides posita est ad salutem; Rom 11:32 (CSEL 81/1γ:387): ut solam fidem poneret, per quam omnium peccata abolerentur. Translations are mine, unless otherwise noted. Concerning the three slightly different versions of Ambrosiaster’s commentary on Romans in CSEL—α, β, γ.—I follow Papsdorf’s position on the general theological unity of all three versions even when I have to choose one of the three arbitrarily. See Joshua David Papsdorf, “Ambrosiaster’s Theological Anthropology: Nature, Law, and Grace in the Commentaries on the Pauline Epistles and the Quaestiones Veteris et Novi Testamenti CXXVII” (Ph.D. diss., Fordham University, 2008), 9 n. 15.
22. Hans Küng, Justification: The Doctrine of Karl Barth and a Catholic Reflection (trans. Thomas Collins, Edmund E. Tolk, and David Granskou; New York: Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1964), 250.
23. Ibid.
24. Quasten, Golden Age of Latin Patristic Literature, 118. Quasten basically follows Souter’s critique of Ambrosiaster’s view on faith. For Ambrosiaster, according to Souter, “freedom from the law is thus considered to mean freedom from the ceremonial law” and “the Mosaic Law, so far as its moral part is concerned, is still in full force and is only excelled by the new law of Christ.” See Souter, Earliest Latin Commentaries, 80 and 81 respectively.
25. Eno, “Some Patristic Views,” 116.
26. Ibid.
27. Papsdorf, “Ambrosiaster’s Theological Anthropology,” 140.
28. Rom 4:3 (CSEL 81/1α:128).
29. CSEL 81/1αβ:118: Iustificati sunt gratis, quia nihil operantes neque vicem reddentes sola fide iustificati sunt dono dei.
30. Rom 4:4 (CSEL 81/1 αβ:128): absolutum est ei, qui legi factorum, id est Moysi, subiectus est aut naturali, non inputari meritum ad mercedem, ut gloriam habeat apud deum.
31. CSEL 81/1γ:131, 133: manifeste beati sunt, quibus sine labore vel opere aliquo remittuntur iniquitates et teguntur peccata, nulla ab his requisita paenitentiae opera, nisi tantum ut credant.
32. Gal 3:10 (CSEL 81/3:33).
33. Ambrosiaster, preface to Commentaries on Romans and 1-2 Corinthians (trans. Bray), 2. Emphasis is Bray’s.
34. Rom 6:15 (CSEL 81/1γ:203): data est enim, ut et reos ostenderet apud deum qui peccaverunt ante legem, . . . sed quia infirmitate inbecillitatis suae genus humanum a peccatis se inhibere non potuit, factum obnoxium mortis infernae, motus deus pietate clementiae suae. See also Rom 7:5; 7:18.
35. Rom 7:14 (CSEL 81/1γ:235).
36. Gal 4:23 (CSEL 81/3:51).
37. Rom 10:4 (CSEL 81/1αβ:344).
38. Bray, “Ambrosiaster,” 26.
39. Ibid., 30.
40. Rom 4:4 (CSEL 81/1αβ:128).
41. Rom 7:4 (CSEL 81/1γ:215, 217): cirografum, quod peccato Adae decretum erat, delevit.
42. Col 1:11-13 (CSEL 81/3:170): quando adtollens nos de ima tartari induxit in caelos cum suo vero filio. See also Col 1:14 (CSEL 81/3:170).
43. Gal 1:4 (CSEL 81/3:8).
44. Gal 5:4 (CSEL 81/3:55).
45. CSEL 81/3:7: Christus . . . pro nobis pateretur, ut nos iustificaret, quos lex reos tenebat, ut eruti a lege per fidem Christi iam non peccatores essemus, sed iustificati secunda nativitate filii dei appellati.
46. CSEL 81/3:7: Christus autem donans delicta non solum vivificavit nos, sed et sibi sociavit, ut filii dei vocemur facti per fidem.
47. Souter views Ambrosiaster’s concept of faith as “the facts forming the content of belief, not the belief itself.” See Souter, Earliest Latin Commentaries, 80. However, to the present writer, Ambrosiaster seems to hold that faith is a personal trust that unites the believer with the gospel. See also Rom 7:3 (CSEL 81/1γ:215): sublati a lege accepta remissione peccatorum et iuncti evangelio non sunt adulteri legis.
48. Rom 12:1-2 (CSEL 81/1γ:395): ad hoc enim dei dono peccatis abluimur, ut de cetero mundam vitam agentes dei amorem in nos provocemus, non irritum facientes opus gratiae eius. . . . quia per donum dei purificati sunt homines et a secunda morte liberati, vivam hostiam debent offerre, ut signum sit vitae aeternae. See also Rom 13:11 (CSEL 81/1γ:427, 429): “It is clear that we are not far from the merit of the promised resurrection since we live well and desire love after washing. And the good life of a Christian is a proof of future salvation. When anyone is baptized, forgiveness, but not crown, belongs to him; afterwards, as he walks in the newness of life but later on, he is already near eternal life [manifestum est, quia post lavacrum bene viventes et studentes caritati non longe sunt a merito resurrectionis promissae. bona enim vita Christiani signum est salutis futura. cum baptizatur ergo unusquisque, ad veniam pertinet, non ad coronam; postea in novitate vitae ambulans vicinus est iam vitae aeternae].”
49. CSEL 81/3:55: fides enim caritate fraterna debet muniri, ut perfectio sit credentis.
50. John Calvin, Commentaries on the Epistles of Paul to the Galatians and the Ephesians (vol. 21 of Calvin’s Commentaries; 22 vols.; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2005), 152-53.
51. Williams, “Justification by Faith,” 662.
52. CSEL 81/3:138: ut si haec non custodierint, nec in ceteris probati videantur, ut quia in aliis nolunt se inprobatos videri, ista quoque servent, ut perfecti sint.
53. Rom 2:12 (CSEL 81/1γ:73): “For naturally the keeper of the law is whoever serves righteousness. . . . This is the work of faith alone, by which he may become perfect, because to abstain from evil will not profit anything to him before God, if he would not receive faith in God, so that he may be righteous by both sides. For that righteousness by keeping the law is temporal, but this righteousness by faith alone is eternal [iustitiam enim naturaliter servans custos legis est. . . . huic sola fides opus est, per quam fiat perfectus, quia nihil illi proderit apud deum abstinere ab adversis, nisi suscipiat fidem in deum, ut sit iustus per utraque. illa enim temporalis iustitia est, haec aeternitatis].” See also Rom 3:20 and Gal 3:12.
54. Rom 4:2 (CSEL 81/1γ:129).
55. See Rom 3:20 (CSEL 81/1γ:115): “He [God] declared that men should be justified, not by the law, which justifies for a time, not before God. Therefore, those who keep the law are justified in time, not before God, since faith, by which men are justified before God, is not in them. . . . For this reason, the law has temporal righteousness, but faith has eternal righteousness [decrevit deus iustificari homines, non per legem, quae ad tempus iustificat, non apud deum. ideo legem servantes in tempore iusti sunt, non apud deum, quia fides, per quam iustificantur homines apud deum, non est in eis. . . . idcirco lex temporalem iustitiam habet, fides aeternam]”; Rom 4:2 (CSEL 81/1γ:129): “For indeed Abraham has glory before God, but by faith, by which he was justified, because no one is justified by the works of the law to the extent that he may have glory before God. And because those who keep the law are justified for the present, he said: if Abraham was justified by works of the law, he has glory, but not before God, but before the world [nam Abraham habet quidem gloriam apud deum, sed ex fide, per quam iustificatus est, quia ex operibus legis nemo iustificatur, ut habeat gloriam apud deum. et quia servantes legem iustificantur ad praesens, ait: si Abraham ex operibus legis iustificatus est, habet gloriam, sed non apud deum, sed apud mundum]”; Gal 3:21 (CSEL 81/3:40): iustitiam hanc dicit, quae apud deum inputatur iustitia, id est fidei, quia et lex habuit iustitiam, sed ad praesens, non quae iustificaret apud deum. For more references to justification before God apart from the works of the law, see Rom 3:20; 4:2, 5; Rom 11:7; and Tit 1:14.
56. Gal 3:21 (CSEL 81/3:40): iustitiam hanc dicit, quae apud deum inputatur iustitia,id est fidei, quia et lex habuit iustitiam, sed ad praesens, non quae iustificaret apud deum.
57. Gal 3:6 (CSEL 81/3:32): Ostendit exemplo Abrahae, qui pater fidei est, iustitiam non ex opere (opera) legis inputari, sed per fidem. credens enim iustificatus est.
58. CSEL 81/1γ:133: cum tegit remittit, et cum remittit non inputat. . . . sine labore vel aliquo opere lavacro remittuntur et teguntur et non inputantur peccata.
59. Eph 1:9 (CSEL 81/3:74): ne illis inputarentur peccata suscipientibus fidem Christi. See also Eph 1:7 (CSEL 81/3:73): duplicem gratiam flagitat, quia et redemit nos sanguine suo et peccata nobis non inputavit, {id est} redemit et manumisit.
60. Gal 3:12 (CSEL 81/3:34): si autem apud deum iustificari vult, ut illi ad meritum proficiat in die iudicii, dei sequatur fidem; Phil 2:13 (CSEL 81/3:146): bona enim conversatio salutem operatur; Phil 3:12 (CSEL 81/3:154-55): quanto magis hi intellegerent elaborandum sibi esse, ut iustificationis merita adipiscerentur; Phil 4:2 (CSEL 81/3:158): omnes [Aevodiam et Sinticen] merito fidei in libro vitae haberi pronuntiat.
61. C. Stephen Sullivan, “The Formulation of the Tridentine Doctrine on Merit” (Ph.D. diss., Catholic University of America, 1959), 76.
62. Ibid.
63. CSEL 81/3:299: redintegraretur praedestinavit, quo tempore et per quos et qua ratione salvari possint, ut neque merito suo qui salvantur neque eorum (horum) per quos vocati sunt (vocantur), sed dei gratia istud donum praestari videatur per fidem Christi.
64. Sullivan, “Formulation,” 3.
65. Needham, “Justification in the Early Church Fathers,” 53.
66. Williams, “Justification by Faith,” 666.