Introduction
This is now the ninth ancient exegete whose opinion as to the meaning of Ephesians 2:8-9 I have consulted. The question is essentially a very narrow one, which is, what is the referent of ‘this’ in Ephesians 2:9? The modern answer is very different to the one in antiquity—the ancient approach has now become both uncommon and grammatically suspect. Thus far I have looked at eight ancient exegetes: seven undeniably well-versed in Greek (Chrysostom, Theodoret, Jerome, John of Damascus, Œcumenius, Theophylact, Marius Victorinus); and the last one is arguably the greatest theologian of his day who has come down to us (Augustine). Of the seven ancient experts in the Greek New Testament that I have researched:
And the eighth, Augustine, while he cannot be called a Greek scholar, is certainly the most important Western theologian of soteriology the first thousand years of Christendom produced. Augustine started off with a soteriology as synergistic as the others, but after a radical theological reorientation, he came to adopt the exegetical reading of the five—that faith is the gift of God—though seemingly not for grammatical or syntactical reasons but for theological reasons. He became the first thoroughgoing monergist whose writings have come down to us.
Now, the facts and findings I have cited above have limitations in terms of their relevance for ascertaining the correct interpretation of Ephesians 2:8-10. Establishing the truth of one of a number of exegetical positions is not determined by counting the number of exegetes on each side of the question. Truth is not automatically determined by majority opinion. Moreover, the Eastern exegetes, particularly Chrysostom, Theodoret, Œcumenius, Theophylact, represent a tradition of interpretation, with the evidence showing that Theodoret and Œcumenius use, rely, and build on Chrysostom, and Theophylact relies on both Œcumenius and Chrysostom. The respect of the later author shown for the earlier suggests that a tradition of interpretation is being evidenced.
However, as five of the seven were native Greek speakers (Chrysostom, Theodoret, John of Damascus, Œcumenius, Theophylact), and the remaining two Latins were renowned translators and almost certainly the leading biblical scholars of their age (Jerome, Marius Victorinus), the evidence is relevant to the grammatical and syntactical question. That is, it is possible that a school of thought might be misled into selecting one of a number of potential meanings of a term—as I argue that six of the seven have done with the biblical idea of divine ‘foreknowledge’ in relation to predestination. That is possible. Indeed, if Marius Victorinus and Augustine are correct about absolute predestination, the other five can only be mistaken. One or the other position might be wrong, or both might be wrong, but both sides of the debate cannot be right at the same time!
But we are now not talking about choosing one of many possible or acceptable meanings of a word, but whether a Greek grammatical and syntactical construction is possible. Can a neuter demonstrative refer back to a feminine noun? And six of the seven ancient Greek New Testament experts make exegetical decisions that answer with a resounding ‘yes’, in spite of them having a substantial theological reason to make an alternative decision that is both open to them and acceptable grammatically.
Our exegete in this paper is a second generation Augustinian, a North African following in the footsteps of Augustine. He digests, consolidates, codifies and applies Augustine’s soteriology in its fully developed form.
Fabius Claudius Gordianus Fulgentius (d.o.b. c. AD 462/3 or 467/8—d.o.d. c. AD 527 or 532)[1], Bishop of Ruspe in North Africa, was born over 30 years after Augustine had died, yet came to be known to church history as ‘Augustinus abbreviatus’. Fulgentius was not an original thinker, but he was an enthusiastic Augustinian and a leading North African Catholic teacher, critiquing both Semi-Pelagianism and Arianism. It is understandable why Fulgentius might be a disciple of and an adherent to the soteriology of the greatest North African theologian known to history.
His father Claudius died when he was very young, and Fulgentius was raised by his religious mother, Mariana, who made him study Greek literature. Fulgentius learnt his Greek letters before his Latin. The Greek aspirates were hard for a native Latin speaker to pronounce, but Fulgentius at an early age had committed all of Homer to memory, and a great deal of Menander, and throughout his life his pronunciation of Greek was excellent. His mother in his early infancy did not permit him to learn Latin literature, as she wanted him in his tender years to learn Greek so that he spoke it as a native Greek speaker, even after some years of disuse.[2] Later, Fulgentius was also well trained in Latin literature.
As a young man, Fulgentius lived an ascetic life, leaving his mother, his management of his family property, and his worldly pursuits as a procurator, to enter a monastery under Bishop Faustus. His mother indeed was horrified, pursued him to the monastery, berated Faustus, and continually called out to Fulgentius, laying traps for him to see him and convince him that he should return to his widowed mother—but all her efforts were to no avail.
When Bishop Faustus was persecuted by Vandal and Arian King Hunneric, Fulgentius fled to a smaller monastery and became co-abbot with Felix, his friend. He reluctantly submitted to ordination as priest and was consecrated bishop in North Africa in AD 507. He was then forced into exile with 60 other North African bishops to Sardinia by the persecution of the Arian king. Fulgentius was a junior bishop at this time, but his opinion was sought by the other bishops, and he frequently wrote pastoral letters on their behalf.
In about AD 515, Fulgentius was summoned by the Arian King Thrasimund to answer 10 theological questions put to him personally by the King. The King was presenting himself as the champion of the Arian party and wanted to defeat the Catholic champion before the people. However, as an opponent, Fulgentius impressed the king, and so Fulgentius remained in Carthage two years. After being too successful in his controversy with the Arians, Fulgentius was returned yet again to Sardinia in exile. In AD 523, Thrasimund died and the exiled Catholics returned to North Africa, including Fulgentius, after which time he served in his diocese. Fulgentius died in either AD 527 or 533.
It is clear that Fulgentius follows the mature Augustine’s exegesis of Ephesians 2:8-10. On verses 8 to 9, he says:
The blessed Paul argues that we are saved by faith, which he declares to be not from us but a gift from God. Thus there cannot possibly be true salvation where there is no true faith, and, since this faith is divinely enabled, it is without doubt bestowed by his free generosity. Where there is true belief through true faith, true salvation certainly accompanies it. Anyone who departs from true faith will not possess the grace of true salvation. (On the Incarnation, 1)[3]
Elsewhere, Fulgentius expounds Ephesians 2:10:
For in this life the only true salvation of men is correct faith in God, “faith that works through love,” through which faith apostolic authority testifies that we have been saved by divine grace, saying, “By grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves. It is a gift of God, not from works, lest anyone be exalted.” And since love must adhere continually to the correct faith (which enables that love to practice good works effectively, and thus to “cover a multitude of sins”), therefore the teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth then adds, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared so that we may walk in them.” He added this lest he dare, out of the presumptuousness of human pride, to claim anything for himself after the faith (through which we have been freely saved) has been approved, and so that instead he might assign even the grace of good works to the benefits of divine goodness.[4]
Here we see Fulgentius clearly arguing that everything good and necessary for human salvation—faith as the beginning of salvation, and the good works which follow it—are all the fruit of divine grace and goodness in working in his elect.
While we cannot tell whether Fulgentius was working off the Greek text—he doesn’t cite the Greek New Testament—we know he was not ignorant of Greek, he could extensively recite Greek classical authors, and he could read and pronounce Greek well. This suggests that we should put him in the class of ‘Latin proficient in Greek’ with Marius Victorinus and Jerome before him.
Apart from the anti-Arian writings, Fulgentius wrote the three books of Ad Monimum (ET: To Monimus) (c. AD 518).[5] Ad Monimum, written to Monimus of Carthage, a fellow adherent of Augustine in AD 518, is a defence of Augustine from the charge that he holds that God predestines evil. Monimus argued that Fulgentius should accept double predestination, and no longer merely say that God has foreseen the wickedness of the non-elect.
Fulgentius responds that God is not the author of sin, but that the one who deserts God is deserted by God. Moreover, it would be unfair of God to punish those for whom sin was a necessity. So Fulgentius says that the way to speak of reprobation is that God has predestined punishment, but not predestined the individuals to sin. God foreknew but did not determine the sinner’s sin, but predestined punishment—because Paul calls them ‘vessels of wrath’, not ‘vessels of sin’. Those punished have brought their punishment upon themselves. But God freely bestows a good will on the elect without any merit, inspires their good works, which they willingly do, and then gives the elect the gift of perseverance. Fulgentius in this work endorses a universal will of God for the salvation of all mankind.
In Epistle 15 (AD 518-19, sometimes called the Epistola syndica) addressed to Scythian monks, Fulgentius admits that humans have a free will, but not a good will. Grace has a priority over human works, but this grace is not given to everyone nor in equal measure. Everyone whom God wants to save were predestined to life. The election or rejection of humans is not based on their foreseen merits but on God’s good pleasure. However, in Epistle 15, Fulgentius revised his previous universalism in relation to God’s saving will as a result of his conflict with the Semi-Pelagian Faustus of Riez (c. AD 405–c. 490). Thereafter, Fulgentius held that ‘God was not willing that any of the predestined perish’.
In Epistle 17 (AD 519-520, also called ‘The Incarnation and Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ’), further precision in Fulgentius' exegesis was provoked by the necessity of responding to Scythian monks in. By that stage, Fulgentius was indicating that in 1 Tim 2:4, God wills all kinds of persons to be saved, but not all people indiscriminately. ‘All’ in e.g. 1 Tim 2:4, does not mean every single person, but the elect, who become believers.
Fulgentius says that God gives faith to people, and so people should ask God for faith. People don’t deserve to receive faith. The Spirit is not given to us because we believe but in order that we may believe. God must enable faith. It is the Maker’s prerogative to pick some people for mercy out of the great mass of sinners. Only God knows why he doesn’t cause everyone to believe. God gives us the enablement not only to will the good, but to carry it out. God saves infants who receive baptism without good disposition, and damns unbaptized babies without any fault stemming from their evil will, but this is not cruelty but justice.
Fulgentius’ last and most mature surviving work against Semi-pelagianism is the three books of De veritate praedestinationis et gratiae Dei (AD 523) (ET: Concerning the truth of predestination and the grace of God). Since the fall, all of humanity forms a mass of guilty and damnable sinners. Man is only free to sin and is enslaved to sin. Man cannot by his own strength love God or have faith from himself, so God must intervene, restore the good will, and generate faith, so that the human will is no longer dominated by iniquity.
God’s grace is both prior to faith as prevenient grace and then follows as sanctifying grace—internally, God illuminates the mind and works in the will. Not everyone receives this grace and faith, and of those who receive it, it is received in different degrees. Salvation shows God’s mercy, damnation his justice:
Let us not regard as unfair the secret reason of the divine will, by which he justifies an unrighteous person while condemning another, only because it is hidden from us.
Regarding predestination, Fulgentius takes what might be called ‘strict or radical’ Augustinian view[6]. Fulgentius again follows Augustine. God’s predestination of the elect is not based on foreseen merit of future actions, but on God’s inscrutable will and his secret decree. God as sovereign controller of the universe has pre-arranged planned, and numbered the predestined. Yet damnation as a function of justice is deserved and merited. God has prepared the wicked to pay for their sins while still not predestining them to commit sins. Prevenient grace is necessary. God does not give prevenient grace to all people, but only the elect, and God does not reward human good will with prevenient grace, but God makes the unwilling person willing through that grace.
Regarding the saving will of God—what does Paul mean when he says that God wills all persons to be saved (1 Tim 2:4)?—Fulgentius has again taken the opposite view that he originally argued for in Ad Monimum. God does not will all to be saved. Rather, God wills to save only the elect, and also that some people are not saved. In this, he follows Augustine’s lead. The ‘all’ in the debated texts refers to the elect from all kinds of nations, tribes, languages, genders, walks of life, circumstances, and conditions. The ‘all’ is taken to be a ‘synecdoche’ whereby the whole stands for the part—in this case, the whole of humanity is represented by a part, the elect. God also hardens the hearts of the non-elect to keep them from coming to a knowledge of the truth.
Of Fulgentius’ works, the best known is De Fide ad Petrum (ET: To Peter on the Faith), an exposition of Catholic faith, addressed to one Peter who wished to pilgrimage to Jerusalem. It is a basic doctrinal guidebook warning Peter against the various Eastern heresies, particularly after the widespread rejection of the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451. In the middle ages, De Fide was widely attributed to Augustine.[7]
In To Peter on the Faith, [8] Fulgentius outlines the mature Augustinian soteriology. Fulgentius describes this as ‘the Catholic faith’ (though Vincent of Lerins may disagree). Nevertheless, Fulgentius says that if anyone stubbornly repudiates or teaches contrary to any one of his points, he is a heretic and an enemy of the Catholic faith, and is to be cursed by all Catholics (Canon 44 §87 p106). My outline here focuses on soteriological rather than Trinitarian or Christological questions Fulgentius decides upon.
Faith is the beginning of human salvation, and without it no one will gain the grace of justification: without faith human effort is empty (§1 p59). After outlining the Trinity and the incarnation of the Son as fully God and fully human—not of heavenly or celestial flesh, but that of every human (§15 p69)—he speaks of the atonement in these words, that Christ ‘having from us up until his death, the penalty of our iniquity’ that he became ‘dead in time because of our iniquity, because of his justice’ (§12 p67).
All humans contract sin from conception because they are born of sexual intercourse, which always occurs with concupiscence—even if they are born to a just marriage without fornication. Christ’s conception was different, being born of the virgin without concupiscence. Because of original sin, all are by nature children of wrath (§16-17, 26 pp69-70, 99-100; Psalm 51:5; Job 14:4). But God in his goodness did not permit the whole mass of humanity to perish forever, but he freely predestined those he willed to be brought to the light. For by undeserved grace, God freed the elect from original sin, while eternal condemnation would hold on to others with an unbreakable bond, ‘especially little children who had neither good nor evil merits of their own will’ (§33 p81). Children who die in the wombs of their mothers or who are born living but die without the sacrament of Trinitarian baptism must be punished in eternal fire (canon 27 §70 p100).
From before the ages, God knows whom he will grant grace through faith (canon 34 §77 p102). Only those predestined will be saved and cannot perish (canon 35 §78 p103). The beginning of a good human will is not from a person, but is bestowed from God (§34 p81). God must by his grace enable someone to believe in his heart (canon 32 §75 p102). Neither the merit of having a good will or good works precede that faith (§43 p88). Unless someone is converted before death (including baptism), they will be burn with fire in eternal torture without end (§36, pp82-3).
Without the sacrament of Trinitarian baptism no one will receive eternal life, except those baptized in their own blood for the name of Christ (canon 30 §73 pp101-102), and those who have received such baptism from heretics or schismatics need not be rebaptised but must return to the Catholic church for baptism to avail them (§43 p88). Even if they are generous givers and martyrs for Christ, heretics or schismatics will not be saved without returning to the unity of the Catholic church (§43 p88). Maybe they will be tortured a bit less for those good works, but they will not be counted children of God (§44 p88). Only in the Catholic church, where God has promised binding and loosing, is penance fruitful (§39 p85).
Salvation is not gained solely by baptism, but after baptism, the baptised must continue in good works and mercy, and perform penance for their sins (which God himself grants), knowing daily that even the holy contract some sins for which they must ask forgiveness daily. The more the body is filled with food and fleshly desires the more the holy might contract sin (§44, 73-4 p p89, 102). Not all who are baptized Catholics will receive eternal life, but only those who live rightly—sinful Catholics will not be able to enter the kingdom of heaven (canon 40 §83 p104).
The Catholic church is a mixed multitude of good and evil, including clergy, with the mixture tolerated in the hope that the wicked will be converted to a good life (canon 43 §86 pp105-106). So Catholics should not seek marriage and they should abstain from meat and wine, though it is not sin to partake of these aspects of God’s creation. Conjugal excess in marriage is only venial sin. Second or third marriages may be legitimately contracted (§45 p90). But anyone who has vowed abstinence and thereafter marries is damned if they marry. Vowing abstinence in marriage is encouraged (§46 p91).
All those justified by faith are given the gift of perseverance in the faith and charity of the catholic church, and while the perfection of glory of the saints vary, eternal life will be same for all (canon 28 §71 p100). This is a development from Augustine’s view under the influence of Romans 8:29-30, as it is clear that for Augustine true regeneration and justification occurs at baptism and is defectible, though the grace of perseverance is a separate gift given only to the elect.
No one can live without sin here below, except those baptized as small children, and it is always necessary to wash away one’s sins throughout the present life by alms and by asking continually for forgiveness (canon 41 §84 p104).
The wicked will be resurrected but corruption will not be taken from them. Just souls, however, freely justified by faith and given good living until the end of their lives (this for Fulgentius is the grace of justification) will receive a spiritual body (§37 p83). By freely predestining them, God has seen to it that they are worthy of the kingdom—they have by God’s free predestination done good things, God has seen to it that they are justified and obedient by giving them grace, and they will go into eternal life (§42 p87).
The Catholic Encyclopedia comments of Fulgentius’ theology:
He himself makes it a matter of faith that unbaptized infants are punished with eternal fire for original sin. No one can by any means be saved outside the Church; all pagans and heretics are infallibly damned. “It is to think unworthily of grace, to suppose that it is given to all men”, since not only not all have faith, but there are still some nations which the preaching of the Faith has not yet reached. These harsh doctrines seem to have suited the African temperament.[9]
The ‘African temperament’ is presumably a reflection of the popularity of the rigorist sect of the Donatists in North Africa, which split occurred in AD 312 after Donatus (d. c. AD 355) and his followers objected to the election of Caecilian as bishop of Carthage in AD 312. Donatism was the majority Christian party in North Africa from AD 360 for the next 30 years. However, during Augustine’s time, the Catholic party grew powerful enough such that severe restrictions were placed on the Donatists in North Africa. Donatism continued until the extinction of Christianity in North Africa in the early Middle Ages. In addition to this or in the alternative, the harsh African temperament might be a reference to the North Africa tradition of magnifying God’s sovereignty and grace.[10]
It is also clear that Fulgentius considers both that justification is a divine making righteous, and that all who are justified are eventually glorified (Romans 8:29-30):
But just souls, which God the Redeemer has here freely justified by faith and has given the justified perseverance in good living until the end, in the very bodies in which here they received from God the grace of justification, and in which, justified by faith, they lived in the love of God and neighbor, they will receive the eternal bliss of the heavenly kingdom; and, when their bodies have been glorified, with the nature of the flesh which God created truly persisting, without a doubt, they will then have spiritual bodies, not animal ones, as the do here. (To Peter on the Faith, §37 p83)
Hold most firmly and never doubt that Christ, the Son of God, will come to judge the living and the dead. To the human beings whom he justifies through faith here by the free gift of his grace, to these same ones who have been justified he gives the gift of perseverance in the faith and charity of the Holy Mother Church until the end. (To Peter on the Faith, canon 28 §71 p100).
However, Fulgentius also held that the sacrament of baptism regenerates, following Augustine:
Hence, everyone, who is cleansed by the sacrament of holy regeneration in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is baptized only in the death and the name of Christ […] When baptism is given in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, each one is regenerated by Him in Whose name he is baptized. When therefore baptism is conferred, in the name of the Trinity, the whole Trinity, which is God one and sole, simultaneously regenerates.[11]
Gavigan summarises the effect of baptism for Fulgentius as:
It confers a special grace and cleanses from sin, both original and personal, while it regenerates the recipient (citing Fulgentius, Epistles 12, 7, 18). We are given in it a rebirth by the same Spirit by which Christ himself was born.[12]
It is undeniable that Fulgentius’ doctrine of eternal punishment for all the unbaptized including miscarried babies and unbaptized infants is harsh and the product of his rigid view of baptismal regeneration. Only when baptism is not tied to regeneration, and predestination in loosed from baptism as a sacrament, is there any hope for miscarried and aborted babies. Predestination untied to baptismal regeneration gives the possibility for a wider view of infant salvation that the rigid Augustinianism of Fulgentius allows. For once divine predestination and the merciful decision of God is the determinative factor for infant salvation, there is hope to be found in the love and kindness of the gracious and merciful God who has bound himself by his own character to make the first last and the last first.
While I have not yet found a statement that baptism justifies in Fulgentius, it is difficult to see how it does not in his system. Thus, if baptism justifies, one would think that on the basis of Romans 8:29-30, all those who are justified are glorified. Indeed, that is exactly what the two paragraphs I have cited above from To Peter on the Faith teach. Here is an unresolved tension in Fulgentius’ theology—inherent in Augustine, but intensified because of Fulgentius’ application of the golden chain in Romans 8:29-30.
Either baptism justifies or it doesn’t (this is not to say that baptism might be the occasion on which something else—faith—justifies). If it justifies, Romans 8:29-30 says that all those justified are glorified: this Fulgentius acknowledges, though Augustine does not. For Fulgentius, all the justified persevere and are glorified. If baptism does not justify, then baptismal regeneration ex opera operato is not true, and the efficacy of the sacrament depends on the disposition of the recipient—worthy reception is required, which is ‘faith’, and may be divinely granted before, during, after the baptism, or not all. That is the Calvinistic position, and that of Gorham in his dispute with the Bishop of Exeter.
Thus, the Calvinist soteriology—which developed from Augustine’s doctrine of unmerited absolute predestination and upon which was added an unmerited forensic justification and perseverance of the saints—could only lead to the dispensing with and denial of baptismal regeneration, because of the inherent incompatibility of baptismal regeneration with the phenomenological reality of water baptism’s undeniable defectibility and ineffectiveness in many (perhaps even a majority of?) candidates, and the overwhelming evidence in Paul that it is faith—and not baptism—that justifies.
The 19th century Protestant theologian James Orr has insightfully and judiciously pointed out this internal tension in Augustinianism and thus the difference between Calvinism and Augustinianism.[13]
[144] […] A second point of difference between Augustine s theology and later (Calvinistic) Protestantism is in his doctrine of predestination. Both Augustine and Calvin (most of the other Reformers likewise) were strict predestinarians. But it is evident that Augustine was involved in a difficulty here by his acceptance at the same time of the Church doctrine of baptismal regeneration. For if all the baptised are regenerated, and if baptism is administered at the will of man, what becomes of the sovereignty of divine grace, or of the certainty of election? It seems difficult to combine a doctrine of election with another which makes every properly baptised person a child of God. The way in which Augustine got over this difficulty was by making the test of election to be, not regeneration simply, but perseverance. All the baptised are regenerate, but only the truly elect have the grace of perseverance. This clearly is not satisfactory; for if there is to be a distinction between elect and non-elect at all, it ought surely to be made to turn on the reality of regeneration in the one as compared with the other; whereas Augustine allows both to be regenerated and justified, only the one receives the grace of perseverance, and the other does not. The truth is, no consistent theory of predestination can ever be united with a [145] consistent theory of baptismal regeneration, and churches which hold to the latter are compelled to modify, or give up, Augustine s view on the former.
Orr’s point is demonstrated by Fulgentius, who in To Peter on the Faith differs from Augustine, in that he says that the justified all persevere to eternal life—Augustine held that justification and perseverance are distinct gifts. Yet Fulgentius doesn’t make it clear that people are justified by baptism in that book. His point is that baptism is necessary but not sufficient for salvation. Perhaps he does not speak of the laver of regeneration in To Peter on the Faith because by teaching that all the justified persevere (as he must according to Romans 8:29-30)[14], he does not have access to even the untenable solution that Augustine devised, that those regenerated and initially justified might not persevere or finally be justified, and that Fulgentius was aware that perhaps he and Augustine might be diverging here.
I consider that Orr’s reasoning is cogent. Augustine by his doctrine of baptismal regeneration must have a real regeneration of all who have partaken of the baptismal font. However, this regeneration for Augustine is defectible—some of those who are truly baptized and thus regenerated do not persevere in faith and are found to fall short of eternal life. The initial justification received is not completed by a final justification by which those baptized are not wholly transformed. Augustine cannot in reality hold that all those who are justified are glorified, and thus the golden chain breaks on his theory—because there are some justified who are not glorified. Of course, the later Augustine would say that this is because they have not been predestined to eternal life. But the important point is that some of those who are truly justified (in baptism) are not glorified (neither in holiness of life nor in eternal life).
This breaking of the golden chain of salvation, and Augustine’s admission of slippage and seepage from it, along with Fulgentius’ seeming distinguishing of justification from baptism and his acknowledgement that all the justified are glorified, eventually necessitated a reassessment of the Augustinian theory of salvation, which historically was provide by Calvin in his modification of Augustinianism which involved:
As we add our ninth exegete to our study of ancient approaches to Ephesians 2:8-10, we see that Fulgentius is not merely Augustine revivified, but while maintaining Augustine’s famous insight as a centerpiece of his system—absolute and unmerited predestination to life—Fulgentius sought to develop the Augustinian system that improved on all which went before it in an even more biblically defensible direction.
While there is no evidence that Fulgentius made his exegetical decisions on the basis of the Greek New Testament, we cannot say he was ignorant of Greek grammar and syntax. In fact, his upbringing had the potential of making Fulgentius one the finest Greek New Testament scholars among the Latins of his generation, and in this he has more in common with Marius Victorinus and Jerome than Augustine.
As to the specific question of this paper, Fulgentius held that it is faith itself which is enabled by God and in this way a gift from God. It is not merited by any foreseen virtue, or indeed anything done by the human. Moreover, not only faith as the beginning of salvation is empowered by God, but the subsequent works that follow faith are prepared, energized, and enabled by God.
Fulgentius’ attitude toward the unbaptized infants while consistent with his sacramentalism, has been viewed by later Catholicism as overly harsh. This causes an epistemic problem, because Fulgentius regards his own view as authentically Catholic and not to be rejected, lest the one who rejects be accursed as a heretic and schismatic. Yet it appears that aspects of Fulgentius’ view have been rejected by later Catholics—such as the damnation of all the non-baptised, including miscarried babies, or the glorification of all the justified.
[1] There is some doubt about the precise dates. Those given in the heading are from Eno’s, Fulgentius: Selected Works. The information for the biographical sketch here—consisting of the facts I think relevant for my limited purposes—is from two sources: (1) John Chapman, ‘St Fulgentius’ in The Catholic Encyclopedia: Vol 6 (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1909) accessed on 29 June 2017 at http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06316a.htm; and (2) Robert B Eno (trs), Fulgentius: Selected Works: The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, Vol 95 (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1997), particularly from the translators ‘Introduction’, xv-xviii and ‘The Life of the Blessed Bishop Fulgentius’, op cit, 3-56, reputedly written by Ferrandus, or by (or who was?) a monk in Sardinia during Fulgentius’ exile.
[2] It appears that another Fulgentius, (Fabius Planciades Fulgentius, also known as 'Fulgentius the Mythographer'), also flourished in Vandal North Africa around the year AD 500: Francis X Gumerlock, ‘The Transformation of Fulgentius of Ruspe in the Carolingian Age’, in K B Steinhauser and Scott Dermer, The Use of Textual Criticism for the Interpretation of Patristic Texts: Seventeen Case Studies (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2013), 77-93.
[3] Mark J Edwards (ed), Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians: Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament VI: (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1998), 133-134; also cited in Oden, Justification Reader, 48. Latin original: CCL 91:313.
[4] ‘Fulgentius’s First Letter to the Scythian Monks’ in Rob Roy McGregor and Donald Fairbairn (trs), Fulgentius and the Scythian Monks: Correspondence on Christology and Grace: The Fathers of the Church Vol 126 (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2013), 43-44.
[5] The information in these paragraphs on To Monimus, Epistle 15, Epistle 17 and Concerning the truth of predestination and the grace of God is gleaned from Guido Stucco, God’s Eternal Gift: A History of the Catholic Doctrine of Predestination from Augustine to the Renaissance (Xlibris, 2009), Chapter 3; James T Dennison Jr, ‘Fulgentius of Ruspe [Review Article]’ Kerux: Journal of the North West Theological Seminary, 20/3 (Dec 2005) 39-41, reviewing Francis X Gumerlock, Fulgentius of Ruspe on the Saving Will of God: The Development of a Sixth-Century African Bishop’s Interpretation of 1 Timothy 2:4 During the Semi-Pelagian Controversy (Lewiston, NY/Lampeter, Wales: Edwin Mellen Press, 2009).
[6] Francis X Gumerlock, ‘Gumerlock: Correspondence on Christology and Grace’ [Review Article]’ Augustinian Studies 45:1 (2014): 94-7, reviewing Rob Roy McGregor and Donald Fairbairn (trs), Fulgentius and the Scythian Monks: Correspondence on Christology and Grace: The Fathers of the Church Vol 126 (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2013).
[7] Eno, Fulgentius: Selected Works, 59.
[8] The following is summarized from ‘To Peter on the Faith’ in Eno, Fungentius: Selected Works, 59ff.
[9] Chapman, ‘St Fulgentius’ at <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06316a.htm>.
[10] Joel Elowsky, ‘Fulgentius of Ruspe on the Saving Will of God’ [Review Article], Augustinian Studies 41:2 (2010): 511-514 at 513.
[11] John J Gavigan, ‘Fulgentius of Ruspe on Baptism,’ Traditio Vol 5 (1947), 313-322 at 315, quoting Fulgentius, Epistle 17 and Ad Trasimundum 3, 35.
[12] Ibid, 317.
[13] James Orr, The Progress of Dogma (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1897), 144-5.
[14] For anyone to argue that there is a true justification that does not issue in glorification, according to Romans 8:29-30, they must say that the justification spoken of there is not the only justification, or that the so called true justification that is defectible is not the one that Paul speaks about in that place. But we are not given any reason to consider that there are a multiplicity of ‘justifications’ in Romans which can be distinguished from each other in such a way, for justification is the final verdict of acquittal and divine finding of or attribution of righteousness brought into the present on account of Christ’s work and applied to the sinner through the instrumentality of faith.