Customer Reviews

Grace, Faith, Free Will

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I first ran into Picirilli when I was doing a research paper on foreknowledge and the Greek word proginwskw. He had a couple of articles in JETS that I utilized, and from there I learned that he was riding a book. I recieved it for my birthday and immediately began to read.
To begin with, I am forced to admit that for the most part all the best books on Soteriology have come from more of a Calvinist direction. However, in Grace, Faith, Free Will, Picirilli has done an excellent job and provides an excellent counter to a lot of these authors. Picirilli does not rely on "whosoever will" proof-texting, so to speak. He gives a fair hearing to the Calvninistic arguments and applies solid exegesis to controversial passages. Though not perfect by far, his book provides perhaps the best defense of Arminian soteriology.
The overall layout of the chapters is well done. His book is divided into sections of three chapters: the first chapter provides the Calvinistic viewpoint of a particular topic (e.g. limited atonement), the second chapter provides the common Arminian viewpoint, and the third chapter examines the key scriptural passages connected with that topic. The topics include total depravity, the atonement of Christ, perseverance, etc., basically all the major topics of soteriology.
Picirilli excels at understanding his opponent's arguments. As he notes early on, it is essential that one be able to lay out one's opponents' arguments in such a way that they themselves will agree that you are being fair. Unfortunately, in my opinion, while Picirilli is fair in examining the Calvinist viewpoint, he does not quote from enough modern theologions (I was, for example, hoping to see him interact some with White's The Potter's Freedom). He relies too much on the 'classic' Calvinist's such as Shedd.
Picirilli provides something that has been missing (to my knowledge) in the discussion of soteriology. He provides an in-deapth look at common Calvinistic rebuttals to common Arminian arguments (his treatment of the Calvinistic interpretation of "all" in such passages as 2 Peter 3:9 is masterful). In that sense Grace, Faith, and Free Will is essential for any serious collection of soteriology--besides arminians or "sub-calvinists" (including myself, by his definition), Calvinists will want it so they can examine and counter Picirilli's arguments. This book provides a good balance to well-written Calvinist books such as The Potter's Freedom, etc. While I certainly do not agree with Picirilli all the time, he makes a lot of good points that one might be hard-pressed to find elsewhere, and I do not hesitate to recommend this book

Robert Picirilli's book is one of the best books that I have ever read on Arminism. Many books seem to get caught up in debating with various Calvinistic or Arminian authors on the subject of the five points of Calvinism or the free will of man. However, this is not the case with Picirilli. He writes with a goal, a focus, and a point.

The book begins with an historical overview of the Calvinism/Arminism debate. He dives into the life of Jacob Arminius and shows that, contrary to various Calvinist historians, he was completely Reformed in his understanding of man (total depravity), God's sovereignty, and election. However, Arminius differed with his Calvinist brothers over the extent of the atonement (limited atonement), evangelism, and free will. He was not Pelagian in his thought but was Reformed and work from that understanding. Picirilli reveals that much of Arminius has been lost due to many of his followers reshaping his thoughts to become more humanistic despite Arminius refusal to do so.

The book goes on to discuss salvation from both the Calvinist and Arminian viewpoints and then Picirilli gives his own Reformed Arminian view.

The book is well written, easy to grasp, and will engage both Calvinist and Arminian readers. I highly recommend it.

Dr. Robert Picirilli is a Free Will Baptist scholar and theologian. He is a former professor of Greek and New Testament studies at Free Will Baptist College. For over 45 years he has been teaching, preaching, and writing Arminian theology. Picirilli stands for a very specific kind of Arminianism that he calls "Reformation Arminianism." This type of Arminianism holds to the following beliefs: total depravity; the sovereignty of God to control all things for the certain accomplishment of His will; God's perfect foreknowledge of, and the certainty of, all future events-including the free moral choices of human beings; the penal satisfaction view of the atonement, salvation by grace through faith and not by works, from beginning to end; and an apostasy that cannot be remedied. He demonstrates that these beliefs (apostasy being more implicitly implied than explicitly stated) are the teachings that Jacob Arminius defended from Scripture. He quotes from The Works of Arminius throughout the book and has provided a helpful index for each of these citations.

This book is not filled with emotional rhetoric but is rather a simple and straightforward stating of the facts. Therefore, for some people, this will not be an "exciting" book to read. Nevertheless, it does serve in accomplishing his goal "to present both sides, so that the reader will know exactly what those issues are: to clarify understanding of both positions and help readers intelligently decide for themselves" (Forward, p. i).

Picirilli begins by giving a brief biography of Arminius that helps to place the issues in their historical context. He then tackles the issues surrounding God's sovereignty, predestination, human depravity, grace, atonement, and perseverance. Picirilli takes great care in accurately representing the Five Point Calvinist position. He quotes mostly from three highly respected Calvinists: Louis Berkof, William Sheed, and Roger Nicole. I would have liked to have seen Picirilli quote from John Calvin himself, yet the people he chose are fine representatives of his theological system.

Picirilli cogently defends conditional election and unlimited atonement. He wisely reminds his readers that "the extent of the atonement should be determined by Biblical exegesis rather than by the logic of one's system" (p. 90). It is Picirilli's detailed exegesis on 1 John 2:2 and 1 Timothy 2:1-6 in chapter seven that I found to be extremely valuable. He concludes this chapter with an important observation:

All of us who handle God's word do well to remember that we do not honor Him with our interpretive ingenuity but with submission to what He says. To say, even to show, that a given statement can be interpreted in a certain way does us no credit at all. The question is always not what the words can mean but what they do mean, here. In 1 John 2:2 and in 1 Timothy 2:1-6, the most obvious meaning of "world" and "all men" is universalistic. In these cases, careful exegesis supports the obvious meaning. (p. 137)

As to be expected, Picirilli defends the biblical doctrine of prevenient grace that Arminius so vigorously held to. He prefers to call the drawing and convicting work of God on all sinners as "Pre-regenerating Grace." I take it as simply an oversight on Picirilli's part, but he does fail to mention John 12:32 in his defense of pre-regenerating grace. This is unfortunate since this verse complements the drawing of the Father mentioned in John 6:44.

In the last two chapters of the book Picirilli gives a solid defense for conditional security. There is a perceptive response that he makes "to Scriptures prized by Calvinists as teaching the necessary perseverance of the regenerate" (p. 200). He writes,

Those passages, especially in the Gospel of John, which contain strong promises of (final) salvation to believers and are therefore thought to imply necessary perseverance can not be used for that purpose lest they "prove too much." . . . For example:

John 5:24
He that believes...
shall not
come into condemnation

John 3:36
he that believes not...
shall not
see life

Grammatically, if the first means that the condition of the believer can not be changed, then the second means that the condition of the unbeliever likewise can not be changed. In fact, neither passage is even speaking to that issue. The unbeliever can leave his unbelief, become a believer, and see life-thus escaping from the promise made to the unbeliever who continues in his unbelief. Likewise, the believer can leave his belief, become an unbeliever, and come into condemnation-thus escaping from the promise made to believers who continue in faith. Each promise applies with equal force to those who continue in the respective state described. (p. 200-201)

Picirilli goes on to convincingly argue from Hebrews 6:4-6 and 2 Peter 2:18-22, that these two passages describe an apostasy that can not be remedied. His careful exegetical analysis has convinced me that he is correct in his conclusion.

A compelling case for holding to Classical Arminianism has been made by Dr. Picirilli. Anyone who is interested in a balanced discussion and a strongly argued case for believing in conditional election, unlimited atonement, and conditional security would do well to read this book. We need more books written from this perspective that provide a detailed exegetical defense for the possibility of apostasy.

For nearly 10 years I have been a serious student of theology. The Calvinist/Arminian issue comes up a great deal and it is important for serious students of theology to study this issue and attempt to discover the truth.

In terms of background, many of the most prominent teachers of our day (RC Sproul, John MacArthur, John Piper, etc.) are diehard Calvinists so that most people are already heavily biased against Arminian theology. Because of the influence of powerful Calvinists, the word Arminian now connotes humanism, liberalism, and being generally soft toward the Bible.

The goal of this book is to study major themes of Scripture (salvation, grace, faith, free will) from both the Calvinist and Arminian perspectives. It is quite systematic, yet fortunately not too long.

I read Picirilli's book having previously studied Arminianism from the lens of Calvinists. It was a stunning read because I now am convinced that Arminius' views are generally mischaracterized. For example, as Picirilli shows in his book, Arminius believed in total depravity and in a substitionary atonement. Arminius was actually the star student of Theodore Beza himself, who in turn was John Calvin's disciple. After having read this book, I now understand Arminius in a very different light.

On each of the points of Calvinism, Picirilli first states the Calvinist position. He is exceedingly fair and goes to great lengths to quote prominent Calvinists in order to articulate the position accurately. After doing so, he looks at the same point from an Arminian perspective.

Because the author is a former professor of Greek and New Testament studies, the scholarship of this book is impeccable. His exegesis is sharp and demonstrates an extraordinary command of the Bible. It is a cool, levelheaded book that does a brilliant job at examining the issue.

No matter what your theological background, you will certainly benefit from reading this fine book.

I found this book to be essentially everything I'd hoped it would be: a fair look at Calvinism and Arminianism (the author is a proponent of "Reformed Arminianism") which is focused on the Biblical and philosophical arguments for Arminianism and not on flinging vitriol at Calvinism and Calvinists. If you've never heard of Calvinism or Arminianism this book may a bit too much, but in general the intellectual level is such that if you read carefully and keep your Bible close by you will not have problems. (One exception to this is the occasional use of terminology which is not really explained and which is not necessarily common knowledge, ex. "Pellagianism"; this is not frequent enough to cause problems.) The author aims to present Arminius's theology ("Reformation Arminianism") and thus avoid some later developments whose roots many would trace to Arminian theology (such as "open theism", a kind of Yoda-like view of God ["Difficult to see. Always in motion the future is."], and compare/contrast this with modern Calvinism (hence the complaints I recall from other reviewers that the author does not cite Calvin himself). Interestingly, the one area where he departs from this aim is in the doctrine of perseverance. Picirilli quotes Arminius as saying he had never taught the possibility of apostasy [loss of salvation] but that some passages of Scripture seem to suggest it. Thus, at least based on what Picirilli cites, Arminius believed in perseverance but had questions, or even doubts, about it. The author departs from Arminius here and argues for the possibility of apostasy in believers who subsequently reject their faith.

The author makes a number of good points that I hadn't thought of before and includes a number of good word studies, particularly regarding a couple of passages which 5-point Calvinists and 4-point Calvinists/Arminians disagree on regarding the atonement of Christ's death for only the elect or for all mankind. As with all books on theology, though, read carefully and read critically. Theologies are manmade constructions which cannot ever hope to contain the greatness of God and His purposes. Whether you agree with Picirilli in part, in whole, or not at all, I think you will find that he is indeed attempting to draw his beliefs from Scripture. Regardless of where we line up in the Calvinism/Arminianism debate, may that be true of all believers.

An honest Christian must be willing to examine the arguments of those who disagree with him. I desire to be an honest Christian, and as a biblical Calvinist, it is imperative that I represent the position of those Arminian minded folks who would dissent from what I believe the Bible teaches. The reformed Calvinist has the bad reputation of hunting down and slaying the "windmill" view of Arminianism. Dave Hunt's horrific book obviously offers such an easy target. An honest Christian, particularly an honest Calvinist, should avoid such vain battles, and actually interact with the Arminian's core beliefs.

That is why I appreciated Robert Picirilli's book, "Grace, Faith and Freewill." He classifies himself as a Reformed Arminian, and he articulates his position well. His book lays out his case by first giving the historical background to Arminius's theology, and the Remonstrant's disagreement with traditional Calvinism. Picirilli then proceeds to outline Arminian theology and provide a biblical exegesis for his case. His book is finely written. It is not one of these pseudo-researched books against Calvinism with pages of superfluous footnotes. Larry Vance's monstrosity, "The Other side of Calvinism," basically an 800 page doorstop, comes to mind.
Moreover, I appreciate the fact that Dr. Picirilli boldly proclaims that he is an Arminian. Many of the folks writing against Calvinism put up this disingenuous aire of "I'm not an Arminian, nor a Calvinist; I only believe the Bible." That just indicates to me that such a person usually has no clue about the fundamental issues surrounding the debate. Also, I was pleased that he wrote respectfully and honestly when examining the disagreements between the two systems. His discussion didn't spiral down to a mournful remembrance of Servetus's burning, as if that event some how discredits the theology of the Reformers. He wasn't trying to hunt down any Calvinistic conspiracies with his work, and the tone he took when writing was pleasant; not the shrill, nails on the chalkboard tone of the likes of Peter Ruckman.
Then finally, I was refreshed that he bathed his book in a reasonable amount of exegetical study. The books I have read in the past critiquing and actually blasting Calvinism, are devoid of any meaningful exegesis. Some authors try to do some exegesis, but it is painfully obvious that they are ignorant of the original languages, or lacks any true theological sophistication to interact with any of the exegetical arguments of the proponents of Calvinism. Dr. Picirilli was not like this and I felt that he had some good work to consider.

Where I felt that the book disappointed, however, was in two areas. First, his over all study of election, the atonement, regeneration and perseverance, operates from the presupposition of libertarian freewill; a presupposition I believe he assumes outright, with out question, before proceeding to outline his arguments. There wasn't any in-depth study on this subject, and I believe that is what he needed to establish before he could make a case for his brand of reformed Arminianism. Granted, he does discuss freewill in the section on the application of salvation, but most of his discussion was philosophical, not biblical, and what biblical study he did give to faith and belief, was neither thorough, nor compelling in my opinion. Even his lengthy study on prevenient grace, what he redefines as "pre-regenerating grace," left a lot of critical questions unanswered.
The second area I felt the book lacked was in the interaction with Calvinist writers and thinkers, particularly modern day ones. He does interact with classic Calvinistic theologies such as Berkhof and Shedd and interacts with Roger Nicole's various journal articles and books defending particular redemption. However, I believe he needed to recognize the works of Bruce Ware, Thomas Schriener, James White, John Piper, RT. McGregor-Wright, Robert Reymond, and the late James Boice to just name a few contemporary writers. In fact, I was rather surprised that he totally overlooked any reference to John Owen's Mount Everest work on the atonement.

Overall, though the book is well written, it is just not thorough enough in answering solid objections of Calvinist thinkers. However, Dr. Picirilli's work is worth the time for an honest Calvinist to consider; if he desires to know the ins and outs of his opponent's beliefs.

See James White's "The Potter's Freedom" for a wecomed response to Norman Geisler's Arminian positions.

F

Having been studying this field for a couple years, I found there to be a huge range of variations in both camps. This book, I felt, clearly explained the key points of the common variations from each camp. And as a beginner I found this helpful.

I am an Arminian in a decidedly Calvinist fellowship (and they still love me.). I recommend this to my friends there because it gives a clear, logically consistent explanation of their view, yet is concise.

The average lay Calvinist only needs to read pages 21-33. The average lay Arminian should read 21-64. They should especially read and reread the section on certainty, contingency and necessity starting on page 37.

If you buy this book, I would also read all of the reviews as they offer useful insights into the topic.

I would put some kind of symbols in section 21-33 indicating where the Arminians disagree. This would make it easier to refer to when reading chapter 3.

Picirilli's work is long overdue as an accurate presentation of the Arminian position. The author does a very good job contrasting the views of James Arminius with Calvinism and the erroneous beliefs of many that would call themselves Arminians today (i.e. Pinnock's open theism).

I especially enjoyed the sections dealing with foreknowledge and predestination. Picirilli makes a very helpful distinction between what is "necessary" and "certian" as pertains to a proper understanding of God's foreknowledge. He argues that while future events are "certian" they are not "necessary", therefore preserving real contingencies as pertains to human freedom.

Picirilli is also careful to present modern Calvanism in all its different flavors in comparing it with James Arminius' understanding of scripture. Picirilli is not concerned with caricatures, and is careful to deal with relevant Calvinist objections rather than straw men.

I was pleased that the author demonstrated that the doctrine of "prevenient grace" (which he prefers to call "pre-regenerating grace") was taught by Arminius and was not a "Wesleyan" departure as some believe. He failed, however, to cite or interact with some of the more relevant passages (John 1:9; 12:32; Titus 2:11; Philippians 2:12-13).

I was also disappointed that he did not interact with passages outside of Heb. 6, and 10, and 2 Pet. 2:20-22 with regards to apostasy. While I agree that Heb. 6, and 10 constitutes an apostasy without remedy (which I would equate with blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, Mark 3:29) I was not persuaded that the same could be said concerning the 2 Pet. passage. I would like to have seen Picirilli interact with passages like James 5:19, 20; Rom. 11:23; Luke 15:11-32; and Gal. 4:19, which seem to indicate an apostasy that is not irrevocable.

All in all the book was very well written and should be read several times to gather its full import. Picirilli is not only an excellent Arminian theologian, but also a skilled exegete and former Greek professor. He writes with grace and tries to accurately present the views of his opponents. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand Arminian theology as Arminius himself taught, and avoid aligning oneself with so many who think they understand Arminianism based on the inaccurate and unfair critiques of staunch Calvinists.

This book is the best introduction to Arminianism available. Picirilli is articulating what he calls "Reformation Arminianism," the actual views of Arminius himself. His arguments are fair and compelling, and any Calvinist will admit that Picirilli has presented their position correctly. The only thing I don't like about this book is the frequency of statements like "Due to lack of space in this volume, I have to restrict my explanation to this one point," and a few typographical errors (which can be expected with the first printing of anything).

This is one of the better books I have read on the subject. Picirilli promotes a flavor of Arminianism what he calls as the reformation Arminianism. And Picirilli demonstrates that this is what originally Arminius himself believed.

This book has very good points for the Arminian side. For example - People have always wondered why after electing a few either by conditional or unconditional election Christ should die for all? And thus write off Arminianism as a self contradictory system. Picirilli answers by saying that unlimited atonement is consistent with conditional election. If God were to elect only hose had faith in him, then Christ should have died for all. If not the unbelievers wouldn't have anything to put his faith (or the lack of it) on.

However there are quite some weaknesses in this :

1. As already pointed out, Not much Interaction with the modern day Calvinists and their works.

2. The work could have been better edited for language, structure and content. In several places the author starts a subject then says 'since space doesn't allow to treat the subject we will not go into it'. He either shouldn't have started the subject or should have given a fuller treatment. He could have put a lot of that stuff in the footnotes. Some important verses are also not treated fully because of 'space' problems. Picirilli could have made better use of footnotes at the end of the page.. And the product could have been better designed to avoid blank pages and in smaller font as to buy some extra space. In one place he says "Since I have never heard this argument put to a Calvinist, I am unable to say how he would respond" Pge 120. Statements like these will affect the credibility of the work and will be made use if someone is writing a refutation of this work. There is a lot of repetition/overlap of the content

3. There is not much treatment of conditional election in the book. Other than Rom 9 he doesn't give much scriptural evidence for unconditional election. Double predestination is also not treated as one would expect a book of this nature. That could have been used to show the weakness of Calvinism

4. There is some good discussion about foreknowledge and freewill - contingency, necessity etc. But then again Picirilli doesn't develop it as a fully fledged system to answer some important questions. He could have done so at least as to relate the discussion to unconditional election.

5. What became of the irresistable grace in the reformation Arminianism? Again this is not treated sufficiently.

But this book is good value for money. I recommend the book to everyone.

M.Alroy Mascrenghe

mark_ai@yahoo.com