Supralapsarianism and Infralapsarianism are two opposing views held by differing Calvinists.

Supralasarianism is also known as antelapsarianism. Sublapsarianism is a minor variant of infralapsarianism.

History

Many prominent early Calvinists were supralapsarian, such as (some argue) John Calvin, John Knox, Theodore Beza, Huldreich Zwingli, Zanchius, Gomarus, Twisse, and Perkins. Subsequent Calvinism was frequently infralapsarian, although supralapsarianism has revived recently (Geerhardus Vos and Gordon Clark).

Historically, infralapsarianism won out at the Synod of Dordt in 1618. In the Canons of Dordt, First Point of Doctrine, Article 7, it states:

Before the foundation of the world, by sheer grace, according to the free good pleasure of his will, he chose in Christ to salvation a definite number of particular people



out of the entire human race which had fallen by its own fault from its original innocence into sin and ruin. (Translation from Ecumenical Creeds and Reformed Confessions, CRC Publications, Grand Rapids, MI, 1988, page 124)

Theology

The terms are often used in a general sense, with supralapsarianism meaning that God planned the fall and infralapsarianism that God merely foresaw, and hence permitted or merely reacted to, the fall. In this sense all Calvinists are supralapsarians, believing that God planned the fall. Nevertheless, inside scholastic Calvinism, the terms came to mean a different thing. Whilst all held that God planned the fall prior to creation, disputes arose as to the logical relation within this plan between the decision to save individuals and the decision to allow the fall. Supralapsarians believe that in the logical order of the divine decrees, individual election and reprobation occur logically prior to the fall, infralapsarians believe they occur logically subsequent.

Both positions are double predestinarian technically, in that God has settled the eternal destiny of both the

The Latin root supra means over, above, or before. The root infra means below, under, or after. Supralapsarianism is the position that the fall occurred (amongst other reasons) to facilitate God's purpose of election and reprobation of individuals, whilst infralapsarianism holds that, whilst the fall was planned, it was not planned in reference to who would be saved. Thus supralapsarians (in the Calvinist sense used here) believe that God chose which individuals to save before he decided to allow the race to fall, the fall serving as the means of realisation of the prior decision to send some individuals to hell and others to heaven, providing the grounds of condemnation in the reprobate and the need for redemption in the elect. In contrast, the infralapsarian holds that God planned the race to fall logically prior to the decision as to which individuals to save or damn out of a fallen race. As such, it is argued that to be saved, one must be subject to something from which one need be saved, and so the fall is logically prior to the decree of election.

Historically, part of the appeal of the infralapsarian position is that it can, at least in part, be viewed as a possible theodicy for the logical consequence of predestination that God is the author of sin.

Supralapsarians are often termed hypercalvinists, although this is a misnomer. All hypercalvinists are indeed supralapsarian, but not all supralapsarians are hypercalvinists.

See also

• Calvinism
• Double predestination
• Hyper-Calvinism
• Calvinist terminology