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Sola fide
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Sola fide (Latin: by faith alone), also historically known as the doctrine of justification by faith, is a doctrine that distinguishes most Protestant denominations from Catholicism, Eastern Christianity, and most Restorationists in Christianity.
The doctrine of sola fide or "faith alone" asserts God's pardon for guilty sinners is granted to and received through faith or belief alone, to the exclusion of all human efforts or works.
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Sola fide (Latin: by faith alone), also historically known as the doctrine of justification by faith, is a doctrine that distinguishes most Protestant denominations from Catholicism, Eastern Christianity, and most Restorationists in Christianity.
The doctrine of sola fide or "faith alone" asserts God's pardon for guilty sinners is granted to and received through faith or belief alone, to the exclusion of all human efforts or works. All humanity, it is asserted, is fallen and sinful, under the curse of God, and incapable of saving itself from God's wrath and curse. But God, on the basis of the life, death, and resurrection of his Son, Jesus Christ alone (solus Christus), grants sinners judicial pardon, or justification, which is received only and solely through the divine gift of faith. Faith is seen as passive, merely receiving Christ and all his benefits, among which benefits are the active and passive righteousness of Jesus Christ. Christ's righteousness is imputed (or accounted) by God to the believing sinner (as opposed to infused or imparted), so that the divine verdict and pardon of the believing sinner is based not upon anything in the sinner, nor even faith itself, but upon Jesus Christ and his righteousness alone, which are received through faith alone. Justification is by faith alone and is distinguished from the other graces of salvation, which always accompany justification. See the Protestant ordo salutis for more detail on the doctrine of salvation considered more broadly than justification by faith alone.
Historic Protestantism (both Lutheran and Reformed) has held to sola-fide justification in opposition to Roman Catholicism especially, but also in opposition to significant aspects of Eastern Orthodoxy. Protestants exclude all human works (except the works of Jesus Christ, which form the basis of justification) from the legal verdict / pardon of justification. Thus, "faith alone" is foundational to Protestantism, and distinguishes it from other Christian communions. According to Martin Luther, justification by faith alone is the article on which the church stands or falls.
Christian traditions answer questions about the nature, function and meaning of justification quite differently. These issues include: Is justification an event occurring instantaneously or is it as an ongoing process? Is justification effected by divine action alone (monergism), by divine and human action together (synergism) or by human action? Is justification permanent or can it be lost? What is the relationship of justification to sanctification, the process whereby sinners become righteous and are enabled by the Holy Spirit to live lives pleasing to God?
Justification in Lutheranism
From 1510 to 1520, Luther lectured on the Psalms, the books of Hebrews, Romans, and Galatians. As he studied these portions of the Bible, he came to view the use of terms such as penance and righteousness by the Roman Catholic Church in new ways. He became convinced that the church was corrupt in their ways and had lost sight of what he saw as several of the central truths of Christianity, the most important of which, for Luther, was the doctrine of justification — God's act of declaring a sinner righteous — by faith alone through God's grace. He began to teach that salvation or redemption is a gift of God's grace, attainable only through faith in Jesus.
"This one and firm rock, which we call the doctrine of justification," insisted Martin Luther, "is the chief article of the whole Christian doctrine, which comprehends the understanding of all godliness." He also called this doctrine the articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae ("article of the standing and falling of the church"): "…if this article stands, the Church stands; if it falls, the Church falls." Lutherans follow Luther in this when they call this doctrine "the material principle" of theology in relation to the Bible, which is "the formal principle." They believe justification by grace alone through faith alone in Christ's righteousness alone is the gospel, the core of the Christian faith around which all other Christian doctrines are centered and based.
Luther came to understand justification as entirely the work of God. When God's righteousness is mentioned in the gospel, it is God's action of declaring righteous the unrighteous sinner who has faith in Jesus Christ. The righteousness by which the person is justified (declared righteous) is not his own (theologically, proper righteousness) but that of another, Christ, (alien righteousness). "That is why faith alone makes someone just and fulfills the law," said Luther. "Faith is that which brings the Holy Spirit through the merits of Christ". Thus faith, for Luther, is a gift from God, and ". . .a living, bold trust in God's grace, so certain of God's favor that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it." This faith grasps Christ's righteousness and appropriates it for the believer. He explained his concept of "justification" in the Smalcald Articles:
Traditionally, Lutherans have taught forensic (or legal) justification, a divine verdict of acquittal pronounced on the believing sinner. God declares the sinner to be "not guilty" because Christ has taken his place, living a perfect life according to God's law and suffering for his sins. For Lutherans justification is in no way dependent upon the thoughts, words, and deeds of those justified through faith alone in Christ. The new obedience that the justified sinner renders to God through sanctification follows justification as a consequence, but is not part of justification.
Lutherans believe that individuals receive this gift of salvation through faith alone. Saving faith is the knowledge of, acceptance of , and trust in the promise of the Gospel. Even faith itself is seen as a gift of God, created in the hearts of Christians by the work of the Holy Spirit through the Word and Baptism . Faith is seen as an instrument that receives the gift of salvation, not something that causes salvation. Thus, Lutherans reject the "decision theology" which is common among modern evangelicals.
For Lutherans, justification provides the power by which Christians can grow in holiness. Such improvement comes about in the believer only after he has become a new creation in Christ. This improvement is not completed in this life: Christians are always "saint and sinner at the same time" (simul iustus et peccator) — saints because they are holy in God's eyes, for Christ's sake, and do works that please Him; sinners because they continue to sin until death.
Roman Catholic view
The Roman Catholic view tends to exclude sola fide as grounds for justification, holding instead that good works are also necessary for salvation, ; that is, by God's grace through faith (also a favour given by him, Matthew 16:17), , and the Christian's response to it in God's grace , as faith perfected by good works, . An Economy of Salvation is taught involving the sacraments, management, and accountability on the part of the Church. Although sola fide tends to be used in a positive manner exclusively by Protestants, personal faith in Jesus Christ is not. The Catholic Mass, as with the Greek Divine Liturgy, includes the Nicene Creed (or in some countries, the Apostles' Creed), which is both a personal affirmation of baptismal belief and a communal confession of faith in "one Lord Jesus Christ." The witness of personal affirmation as faith in one Lord Jesus Christ, as it is understood by most Evangelicals, is seen in the Catholic term 'devotion' to Christ (and his saints) in private prayerlife and in active moral, spiritual and political engagement:
"Where sin has perverted the social climate, it is necessary to call for the conversion of hearts and appeal to the grace of God. Charity urges just reforms. There is no solution to the social question apart from the Gospel" CCC 1896.
The following is one of explanation given by Trent on justification:
In what manner it is to be understood, that the impious is justified by faith, and gratuitously.
And whereas the Apostle saith, that man is justified by faith and freely, those words are to be understood in that sense which the perpetual consent of the Catholic Church hath held and expressed; to wit, that we are therefore said to be justified by faith, because faith is the beginning of human salvation, the foundation, and the root of all Justification; without which it is impossible to please God, and to come unto the fellowship of His sons: but we are therefore said to be justified freely, because that none of those things which precede justification-whether faith or works-merit the grace itself of justification. For, if it be a grace, it is not now by works, otherwise, as the same Apostle says, grace is no more grace.
The Catholic position is not one of works alone. The Catholic Church has opposed that position well over one thousand years prior to the Reformation in the Councils of Carthage and Orange. The Church rejects "works of debt" and works of our "own righteousness" because these works are not done in grace, works are only good if they are done in grace.
In 1999 the Lutheran World Federation and the Roman Catholic Church jointly issued a statement, the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, that stated that the LWF and the Roman Catholic churches agreed about the basics of Justification and lifted certain Roman Catholic anathemas formerly applying to the LWF member churches.. While some Lutheran theologians saw the Joint Declaration as a sign that the Roman Catholic Church was essentially adopting the Lutheran position of sola fide justification, most Lutheran theologians disagreed, claiming that, considering the public documentation of the Catholic Church's position, this assertion does not hold up.
Latter-Day Saint view
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints view excludes sola fide by holding that a person cannot be saved without works , but is saved by the grace of God after "all [that] we can do" . The Plan of Salvation teaches, among other things, that mankind is here to be tested in its faith in God and that all mankind must believe in Christ, using the atonement as the vessel for obtaining forgiveness through repentance. Further, that true faith is demonstrated by works. Works do not "save" the individual, but they are evidence of faith in Jesus Christ.
With its headquarters in what has been called "Protestant America," The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been the recipient of extreme criticism from its evangelical counterparts over its exclusion of sola fide in its teaching of salvation through Jesus Christ. This criticism has not been without controversy, however, as American evangelical writer and minister John F. MacArthur points out that "...it also condemns the doctrine of the Catholic church."
Origin of the slogan
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