Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms

e consensu gentium: from the consent of all peoples; a form of argument resting, not on logical proof, but on the general agreement of all people and nations; an argument typically added by the Protestant scholastics to the traditional a posteriori proofs of God’s existence in the refutation of atheism preliminary to the locus de Deo.

e contrario: on the contrary, on the other hand; also e contra.

e converso: conversely.

ecclesia (from the Greek ἐκκλησία, ekklēsia): church; the orthodox describe the church of all believers in all ages as the ecclesia universalis, the universal church, and less frequently as ecclesia catholica, catholic church. The universal church is distinguished into two states, the ecclesia militans, or church militant, and the ecclesia triumphans, or church triumphant. The ecclesia militans is the earthly church presently engaged in Christian warfare against sin, death, and the devil. The scholastics distinguish between the ecclesia militans defined proprie et praecise (properly and precisely), i.e., the congregation of the saints or of believers (congregatio sanctorum; congregatio credentium), and the ecclesia militans defined improprie et per synecdochen (improperly and by synecdoche), i.e., the whole church, in which faithful and unfaithful, saints and hypocrites, are mixed. The ecclesia triumphans is the church of the beati (q.v.), or blessed, both now and in eternity; it is the church at rest.

The ecclesia militans can also be distinguished into the ecclesia synthetica, or collectiva, and the ecclesia repraesentativa (q.v.). The former term identifies the whole body of believers, including clergy and teachers, while the latter identifies the ministerium ecclesiasticum, the ministers of the church concerned to preach the Word and teach sacred doctrine. This distinction is favored by the Lutherans and adapted by the Reformed, who identify the ecclesia repraesentativa not simply as clergy and teachers but primarily as the church gathered in presbyteries and synods for the sake of governance. The church is also distinguished, by Reformed and Lutherans, into the ecclesia visibilis and the ecclesia invisibilis; the former term refers to all those who belong outwardly to the church as the ecclesia militans improprie dicta, the church of the saints and the hypocrites, the elect and the nonelect together; the latter term refers to the coetus electorum, or community of the elect, which is the ecclesia militans proprie et praecise dicta and the mystical body of Christ (corpus Christi mysticum). See attributa ecclesiae; notae ecclesiae; regimen ecclesiasticum.

ecclesia docens / ecclesia discens: the teaching church / the learning church; a distinction used by Roman Catholics but rejected by Protestants. The teaching church (ecclesia docens) consists in the hierarchy of the pope and the bishops, in whom resides the magisterium (q.v.), or teaching authority; the learning church (ecclesia discens), consists in the body of the faithful, whose duty it is to accept the truth of the church. Since priests teach only by the authority of the bishop, they belong, with the laity, to the ecclesia discens.

ecclesia particularis: the particular church; i.e., the individual congregation. See ecclesia.

ecclesia repraesentativa: the representative church; viz., the ministers and elders who represent the church in its governing bodies. The Protestant orthodox are careful to warn against the identification of the church with a hierarchy as taught by Rome (see ecclesia docens / ecclesia discens) and point out the purely administrative function of such bodies and the subordinate role of all confessions or doctrinal statements produced by ecclesiastical assemblies. The ecclesia repraesentativa does not make declarations by divine right (iure divino, q.v.) and must remain obedient to and be itself governed by God’s Word. See ecclesia; norma; potestas ecclesiae.

Ecclesia semper reformanda est: The church is always to be reformed or always needing to be reformed; a saying often attributed to the early modern Reformed but as yet not documented from their actual usage. The phrase and its variants, Ecclesia reformata et semper reformanda; Ecclesia reformata quia semper reformanda; and Ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda, secundum verbum Dei, are most probably all twentieth-century inventions, employed for the sake of justifying doctrinal change. Early modern identifications of the church as reformanda do not carry with them the modern claim that it was the intention of the Reformers that doctrine be constantly modified to suit the times: rather, use of the term connoted such things as the need to move further away from the abuses and superstitions of the Roman church or, in a seventeenth-century application identified among Dutch Reformed pietists, a need to be continually observant in the reformation of Christian life. The term Ecclesia Reformata or, in the plural, Ecclesiae Reformatae, by contrast, was consistently used to indicate the true church, reformed in doctrine and practice as intended by the Reformers and defined by its confessions. Note the title of the harmony of confessions published in Geneva in 1581: Harmonia Confessionum Fidei, Orthodoxarum et Reformatarum Ecclesiarum, quae in praecipuis quibusque Europae Regnis, Nationibus, & Provinciis.

ecclesiola: little church; the idea of small-group meetings of Christians for prayer and study of Scripture; such groups initially arose among Reformed pietists in the Netherlands and later among Lutheran pietists. In the latter part of the seventeenth century, the groups were identified as collegia pietatis, pious or spiritual gatherings. The term ecclesiola is more closely associated with Spener’s pietist movement, which viewed this kind of gathering as an ecclesiola in ecclesia, a little church within the church. The intention of the term was to indicate an intentionally orthodox and nonseparatistic group meeting within the church. The Lutheran orthodox, however, typically opposed such meetings, arguing that, when held without the presence of clergy and without explicit sanction of clergy and church, they were in fact fundamentally separatistic, sectarian, and liable to produce distortions and misinterpretations of the church’s doctrines. The Reformed, particularly exponents of the Dutch Nadere Reformatie, were generally more accommodating to such meetings.

effectus: effect. See causa; eventus.

efficacia: efficacy; used with reference to the application of Christ’s work to the elect, as distinct from its sufficient accomplishment. See impetratio; meritum Christi; satisfactio vicaria; sufficientia; universalismus hypotheticus.

efficacia mortis Christi: efficacy of the death of Christ. See sufficientia.

efficaciter: effectively, with efficacy.

efficax: effective, effectual; sometimes the Greek ἐνεργητικός (energētikos) is used.

efficientia: efficiency, effectiveness; specifically, the work or operation of an efficient cause (causa efficiens, q.v.). See satisfactio vicaria; sufficientia.

eisagōgikos (εἰσαγωγικός): introductory.

ekdosis (ἔκδοσις): taking off, putting off; used by the Protestant scholastics as a term opposed to endysis (ἔνδυσις), putting on, in the description of repentance and conversion. See poenitentia.

ekporeusis (ἐκπόρευσις): procession. See processio.

ekthesis (ἔκθεσις): exposition or explanation; exegesis of a text.

ektypos (ἔκτυπος): ectype; copy or reflection of the archetype, or ultimate pattern.

electio: election; the positive part of predestination, according to which God chooses in Christ those individuals who will be his eternally. The Lutherans and the Reformed both ground electio in the love of God but differ in their formulations of election in relation to faith and justification. For the early orthodox Reformed, Christ is the sole fundamentum electionis (q.v.), and the ultimate choice of some rather than others is set in the depths of the divine will, apart from any consideration of individuals, in order to safeguard the sola gratia of salvation; for the Lutherans, the ultimate choice of some rather than others lies in the mystery of justification by faith. Many of the seventeenth-century orthodox therefore describe the divine choice as taking place in view of faith (intuitu fidei, q.v.). The language of intuitu fidei never intended to make faith a cause of election and, indeed, always stood juxtaposed with the declaration of salvation by grace alone and of the origin of faith in grace. It stands, however, over against the Reformed view, according to which faith and justification could be reduced to mere elements in a causally rigid order of salvation (ordo salutis, q.v.) resting on election. See praedestinatio; praeteritio; reprobatio.

electio intuitu fidei finalis, ex praevisa fide finali: election in view of final faith, through foreknowledge of final faith. See intuitu fidei.

elementum: element, principle, first principle; usually found in the plural, elementa. In medieval and early modern physics (physica, q.v.), there are four elements of which the world (mundus, q.v.) is composed: fire, air, earth, and water. These elements represent combinations of the four ultimate contraries of nature: heat, cold, dryness, and moisture. Fire is a union of heat and dryness, air of heat and moisture, earth of cold and dryness, and water of cold and moisture. Beyond the sphere of the moon (in the Ptolemaic, or geocentric, system of the universe), there is also the quintessentia (q.v.), or fifth element, the aether, but it not present on earth and cannot be known by human beings (except for the fact that it exists in its proper place).

elenchticus, -a, -um (adj.): elenctic(al), for the purpose of confutation or logical refutation; a descriptive adjective frequently used by Protestant scholastics with reference to the polemical section of their dogmatic systems. Whereas polemical indicates simple attack, elenctic(al) implies refutation leading toward positive statement.

elenchus (from the Greek ἔλεγχος, elenchos): a logical refutation; frequently set in the form of a syllogism.

emanatio: emanation, an outflow; a term used by the scholastics to refer to creation, not in the Neoplatonic sense of an actual efflux of the divine being or a differentiation of the divine being into a descending series of lesser spiritual and ultimately material beings (a contradiction of the creation ex nihilo, q.v.), but rather in the sense of an outpouring from absolute Being, primum ens (q.v.), of the power that brings things into being, or in the sense of the divine conservatio (q.v.), or concursus (q.v.). The continued existence of the contingent order rests upon the continuus Dei in creaturas influxus, the continuous inflowing of God upon creatures.

emmenonta (ἐμμένοντα): immanent or inward things, belonging to one subject; opposed to metabainonta (q.v.).

emperichōrēsis (ἐμπεριχώρησις): mutual interexistence or inexistence (mutua inexistentia); a term applied to the interpenetration of the persons or hypostases of the Godhead, indicating the interrelation of the persons in their very subsistence. See circumincessio; subsistentia; Trinitas.

emphanismos (ἐμφανισμός): a disclosure, revelation, or manifestation. See patefactio; revelatio.

enantion (ἐναντίον): a real contradiction. See enantiophanēs.

enantiophanēs, -es (ἐναντιοφανής, -ές, adj.): containing an apparent contradiction (in Scripture); a place where the reader of Scripture might assume a contradiction, particularly a contradiction in the divine will, e.g., Exodus 9:1–12 and 10:20–27, where God wills the liberation of Israel but also hardens Pharaoh’s heart. The scholastics invariably deny real contradictions and seek exegetically and doctrinally to resolve the apparent ones.

endiatheton (ἐνδιάθετον): immanent; resting or residing within. See Logos asarkos; Logos endiathetos / Logos prophorikos.

endysis (ἔνδυσις): putting on; e.g., Romans 13:14; Colossians 3:10; a scriptural term used in the description of repentance as the vivification (vivificatio, q.v.) of believers, specifically, as “putting on the new man.” See poenitentia.

energeia (ἐνέργεια): power, operation (derived from ἐν [en, in] and ἔργον [ergon, work]); in Aristotelian philosophy, the state or condition of actuality or perfect actualization and operation; in Latin, actus.

energētikos (ἐνεργητικός): effective.

enhypostasis (from the Greek ἐνυπόστασις, enypostasis): literally, inpersonality; having one’s subsistence in the subsistence of another; usually applied to the human nature of Christ with reference to the identification of the “person,” or subsistence, of Christ as the eternal person of the Word, which in time has assumed a non-self-subsistent, or anhypostatic, human nature. The purpose of this formulation, which arose after Chalcedon principally in the thought of John of Damascus (De fide orthodoxa 3.9), is to safeguard the union of the two natures through affirmation of the oneness of Christ’s person: his person is divine and not the sum of the two natures. Less often, the term is applied to the Father, Son, and Spirit in their circumincessio (q.v.), since they subsist in one another, having the divine ousia (q.v.) in common. See anhypostasis; emperichōrēsis; persona Christi; subsistentia.

ens: being (generally); a being, an existent, a thing; in scholastic theology and philosophy, as distinct from most contemporary, post-Kantian philosophy, ens is the most simple predicate. It indicates the reality of a thing, namely, the coincidence of esse (q.v.), or the actus essendi (q.v.), the act of existing, with essentia (q.v.), the essence or “whatness” of a thing. In the case of the entire finite or contingent order (see contingentia), ens is not a necessary or essential predicate, since there is nothing in the essentia, or whatness, of a contingent being to indicate that it must be (that would, of course, be self-contradictory): all finite things can eventually not be. In the sole instance of God, however, esse is an essential or necessary predicate: God cannot not-be, since it is of the very essence, or whatness, of God that God always is. By definition, any being that need not exist cannot be God. In God, as distinct from all other beings, esse and essentia are inseparable. It belongs to the whatness of God that God is fully actualized existence, actus purus essendi and ens necessarium. See actus purus.

In traditional metaphysics, being is understood as having three transcendental properties: it is one (unum, q.v.), true (verum), and good (bonum, q.v.), in a very specific sense. Being is “one” inasmuch as it is what it is and is not divided: a being is a substantive unity, an individual thing (res, q.v.)—which is not to say that an individual being cannot be complex. It is “true” in the sense that it can be understood or is intelligible. Each individual being is an intelligible species that can leave its impress on the mind and be known to reason. Being is also “good” in the sense that it is characterized by its own natural perfection in simply being what it is according to its appropriate species, mode, and order.

Ens (or res) can be distinguished further as either ens extra mentem, a being or thing outside of the mind, or ens rationis, a being or thing belonging exclusively to the mind prior to or apart from its external entity, literally, a “being of reason.” Ens rationis is called ens only improprie, since it has no independent esse, whereas ens extra mentem or ens realis is in the proper sense, proprie, ens. Thus the idea of a horse is an ens rationis, but the horse itself is an ens realis and can be called ens or res extra mentem, whereas a unicorn is only ens rationis. This distinction is crucial to the argument over universalia (q.v.), since the merely rational, intramental existence of universals would deny to them the status of ens in a strict sense.

Ens, or being, is also understood either as a singular or as a universal. In the traditional Aristotelianism of the early modern era, singular being is the primum cognitum, or first known, inasmuch as singulars must be known prior to universals, and the universal must be abstracted from the singular. Universal being or being in general is the object of traditional metaphysics. See proprie; proprietates entis; proprium.

ens a se: being from itself; i.e., self-existent, necessary, noncontingent being, i.e., God. Ens a se is thus distinguished from all other ens or entia ab alio, beings from another. See aseitas; ens.

ens causa sui: being or existing because of oneself; a variant of ens a se (q.v.), indicating a necessary being whose existence is not dependent on another, namely, God.

ens per se: a being through or on account of itself; namely, an individual thing or, in Aristotelian terms, a substance in the primary sense. See substantia; unum per se.

ens perfectissimum: most perfect being; i.e., God.

ens realis / ens rationis: real being / rational being or being of reason. An ens rationis is a matter of thought or reason that does not necessarily have any actuality outside of the mind, whereas an ens realis is an actual being or thing that has an extramental actuality. See ens.

ensarkos (ἔνσαρκος): in the flesh; i.e., incarnate; a distinction is frequently made between the eternal Word as Λόγος ἄσαρκος (Logos asarkos) and the Word incarnate, the Λόγος ἔνσαρκος (Logos ensarkos), resting on a basic reading of John 1:1–2, 14. The distinction itself, like that between the Logos in the Godhead (Logos endiathetos) and the Logos sent forth (Logos prophorikos) is of patristic origin. See incarnatio; Logos asarkos.

ensarkōsis (ἐνσάρκωσις): incarnation. See ensarkos; incarnatio.

entelecheia (ἐντελέχεια): entelechy; i.e., the inner telos, that which accounts for form; in the Aristotelian psychology held by the scholastics, the soul. In the basic philosophical sense of inner telos, or guiding form, the entelecheia is that which mediates between matter and form, potency and actuality. The matter or substance of a thing (materia, substantia: Greek ὕλη, hylē), as such, conveys the essence of the thing (essentia, q.v.; οὐσία, ousia) only potentially, whereas the form, as considered in itself as actuality, requires embodiment. The actualization of the thing, the union of matter and form in development and occurrence, the movement from potency to act, rests upon the inner telos, the inward principle of self-realization; the motive force of the development is κίνησις (kinēsis) or μεταβολή (metabolē), the activity or transition from potency to actuality. Description of the soul as entelechy marks an important counter, both for philosophy and for scholastic theology, to the Platonic dualism of soul and body. Just as Aristotelianism allows no separation of form and matter and no independent, extramental existence of universalia (q.v.), so does it deny the dualism or separability of soul and body. The body, in Aristotelianism, is regarded not as the tomb of the soul but as the natural place of the soul’s existence, where alone it can exercise its faculties of intellectus (q.v.) and voluntas (q.v.) and in which alone it can perform its formal function. In this view, the human being is termed a composite substance (substantia compositiva), and the soul in itself is termed spiritus incompletus (q.v.). Thus the Protestant scholastics can call the soul the forma corporis (q.v.), or form of the body, and the forma informans (q.v.), or informing form of the body, defining the body itself as the formata, or thing formed. See anima; forma; in actu; mē on.

enthusiastae: enthusiasts or fanatics (from the Greek ἐνθουσιασμός, enthusiasmos, ecstasy or possession by the divine).

entia ab alio: beings from another; viz., all contingent being. See ens; ens a se.

eo instante: in that instant, instantly.

eo ipso: by that itself.

eo loci: in that place.

eo nomina: by or in that name.

eodem modo: in the same way or manner.

epieikeia (ἐπιείκεια): forbearance, restraint; used by the fathers with reference to virtuous men, specifically with reference to Christ and his teaching of virtue in the face of evil and persecution.

epignōsis (ἐπίγνωσις): knowledge; particularly, a knowledge of divine truth.

epilēptōr (ἐπιλήπτωρ): a person who censures others.

epiphaneia (ἐπιφάνεια): epiphany; appearing or appearance; especially the advent of Christ (adventus Christi, q.v.), both Christ’s first appearance (2 Tim. 1:10) and Christ’s final coming (1 Tim. 6:14).

epistēmē (ἐπιστήμη): knowledge or understanding; in Aristotelian philosophy, genuine knowledge consisting in an understanding of the reasons or causes of things, according to which things are what they are and the way they are; in other words, a science. See sapientia; scientia.

epizeuxis onomatōn (ἐπίζευξις ὀνομάτων): the linking together of names or properties. See communicatio idiomatum.

equivocus. See aequivocus.

erōtēma; pl., erōtēmata (ἐρώτημα, ἐρωτήματα): a question; specifically, a logical premise stated as a question for the sake of disputation; thus erotemata theologiae as a description of a series of disputations arranged in systematic form. See disputatio; medulla.

erōtēsis (ἐρώτησις): questioning or request.

eschaton (ἔσχατον): eschaton; the end; the end of the world. See adventus Christi; consummatio saeculi; dies novissimus.

esse: literally, to be; viz., existence or having being; also the act of existing (actus essendi, q.v.). Esse can therefore refer to a being or to actuality (actus, q.v.). Any given individual must have essentia (q.v.), or whatness (quidditas, q.v.), and esse, the act of existing. E.g., a human being must have both humanity, the human essentia, and actual existence, esse. Actual existence without essentia is nonsense and unidentifiability, while the essentia of humanity without the act of existence or actual existence, esse, is a mere concept. The actual being or esse of a thing is the foundation, or principium (q.v.), of all its actions or operations. See agere sequitur esse; ens; modus operandi.

essentia: essence; the whatness, or quidditas, of a being, which makes the being precisely what it is; e.g., the essence of Peter, Paul, and John is their humanity; the essence of God is deity, or divinity. See agere sequitur esse; ens; esse; essentia Dei; natura; quidditas; substantia.

essentia Dei: the essence, or “whatness,” of God; God is the only necessary, self-existent being, or in other words, the only being in whom esse (q.v.), or existence, and essentia (q.v.), or essence, are inseparable; it is of the essence or “whatness” of God that God exist. Thus the essence of God, as distinguished from the divine attributes (attributa divina, q.v.), can be described as independent or self-subsistent spirit. This view of the divine essence coincides, the scholastics note, with the biblical self-description of God (Exod. 3:14) as the one who is.

essentialiter: essentially; Latin equivalent of ousiadōs (q.v.), as opposed to personaliter or hypostatikōs (q.v.); specifically, one way of predicating names of God. Thus “Father” can be predicated of God either essentialiter or personaliter. “Father,” predicated of God essentially, indicates the entirety of the Godhead or divine essence, which stands over against the finite order as Creator and Regenerator, i.e., the “one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in . . . all” (Eph. 4:6). In this sense, “Father” indicates, according to the scholastics, Father, Son, and Spirit, since the whole of the Triune Godhead is over all and through all and in all. When “Father” is predicated personally of the Godhead, however, it refers to the First, Unbegotten Person of the Trinity, not in relation to creatures as such, but rather in relation to the Son and to the Spirit. The name “Father” is predicated of God as Creator, as the unbegotten subsistence in the eternal relation of persons in the Trinity and also as the God who adopts believers as his children. The scholastics also view adoption in Christ as the basis for an essential predication, since the work of salvation is the common work ad extra of all three persons of the Trinity. It is thus the whole Godhead—Father, Son, and Spirit—that is called Father by the redeemed.

ethnici: literally, ethnics; i.e., pagans.

euarestia (εὐαρεστία): acceptance, approbation; specifically, the divine approbation, related to the preceptive will (voluntas praecepti) of God and distinguished from the eudokia (q.v.), or good pleasure, of God in his decree. The divine euarestia refers to what is pleasing to God in the sense of his revealed will, as distinct from the divine good pleasure (beneplacitum) in the sense of the ultimate will of God. See eudokia; voluntas Dei.

eucharistia (εὐχαριστία): thankfulness, or a giving of thanks; hence, the Eucharist, the celebration of the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor. 10:16). See coena sacra.

eudokia (εὐδοκία): goodwill, good pleasure, favor; used by the Protestant scholastics as a synonym for benevolentia (q.v.) or favor Dei (q.v.) in their discussions of the attributa divina (q.v.) and the opera Dei ad extra (q.v.). In Reformed orthodoxy the eudokia, or beneplacitum (q.v.), of God is the ground of God’s elective choice (Eph. 1:5). A contrast is therefore made between the divine eudokia, or decretive good-pleasure, and the divine euarestia (q.v.), or divine approbation, or preceptive willing. See voluntas Dei.

eulogia (εὐλογία): a praise, blessing, or consecration; e.g., Hebrews 12:17.

eutaxia (εὐταξία): a good commandment (cf. Eph. 6:2).

evacuatio: emptying or evacuation; a Latin word used with exinanitio (q.v.) to render the Greek kenōsis (q.v.).

evangelium: (from the Greek εὐαγγέλιον, euangelion): gospel; literally, good news; used throughout the New Testament to indicate the good news of God’s gracious offer of salvation. Because of its centrality to the New Testament message, the term is favored by the orthodox as a reference to the promise of salvation offered in Christian preaching. Nonetheless, given the identification of evangelium as the promise of salvation by grace, gospel is not to be identified with the New Testament, but with the promise of gracious salvation found throughout Scripture in both Old and New Testaments. Even so, the distinction between law (lex, q.v.) and gospel is not a distinction between the Old and the New Testaments.

Evangelium est Deus absolvens et iustificans: The gospel is God absolving and justifying.

eventus: event; i.e., the result of an action, an effect. Note the maxim Eventus est qui ex causa sequitur; et dicitur eventus quia ex causis evenit: An event is that which follows from a cause; and it is called an event because it eventuates or arises from [its] causes. See causa.

Ex abusu non arguitur in usum: From an abuse it may not be argued against a use; i.e., it is illegitimate to argue against the use of a thing on the ground that it has been abused. Misuse, misinterpretation, and misunderstanding cannot be proper grounds for argument. See abusus.

ex acceptilatione: through acceptation; also ex acceptatione. See acceptatio.

ex adverso: on the other side; on the basis of an opposite principle.

ex altera parte: on the other part.

ex auditu: from the hearing.

ex cathedra: from the cathedra, or episcopal seat. The cathedra is the chair of the bishop from which this bishop speaks authoritatively and which identifies the church in which the bishop has his seat as a cathedral. A large church that is not the seat of a bishop is thus technically not a cathedral.

ex concesso: from what has been granted; specifically, an argument based on the admission or concession of one’s opponent.

ex debito: from debt or obligation; thus ex debito naturali: from natural obligation; and ex debito iustitiae: according to the obligation of justice or right; by right.

ex hypothesi: from the hypothesis, by hypothesis, hypothetically, conditionally; thus a conclusion that can be drawn or an event that can occur given a prior condition. Thus also necessitas ex hypothesi, necessity by hypothesis, a conditional or hypothetical necessity, as a synonym for necessitas consequentiae (q.v.), the necessity of the consequence. See universalismus hypotheticus.

ex more: by custom.

ex natura rei: from the nature of the thing.

ex necessitate: by necessity; thus ex necesitate legis: by necessity of law; and ex necessitate rei: by the necessity of the thing. See necessitas; necessitas consequentiae; necessitas consequentis.

ex nihilo: out of nothing; referring to the divine creation of the world not of preexistent and therefore eternal materials but out of nothing. This view is normative for Christian theology and is consonant with the theory of a two-stage creation, i.e., (1) of the material substratum of things and (2) of actual things by the informing or imparting of form to matter.

It also implies the denial of nothingness in the sense known to Greek philosophy, the Platonic mē on (q.v.), the nihil (q.v.), an indeterminacy or plastic, pregnant nothingness that somehow limits the divine creative act. Against the philosopher Lubinus and the mystic Boehme (Jakob Böhme), who revived the Platonic schema and insisted on the limiting reality of non ens, the Protestant scholastics argued for a nihil negativum, materiam excludens, a negative or absolute nothingness, excluding matter, having no characteristics and in no way limiting the work of God; it is pure space and is in no way either a substratum or a precondition for creation. The void or chaos that appears as a first stage of creation stands over against the negative nothingness of space as a nihil positivum, a positive nothingness, a material substratum that is as yet nothing, a primary matter prior to the creation of the substances of things. See creatio; Ex nihilo nihil fit; materia prima.

Ex nihilo nihil fit: From nothing, nothing comes; a traditional philosophical maxim frequently employed in relation to the Christian doctrine of creation ex nihilo (q.v.) in scholastic debate over the relation of philosophy to theology, specifically in relation to the question of duplex veritas (q.v.), or double truth. The Protestant scholastics allow the maxim Ex nihilo nihil fit as representing the limit of natural reason and as supplemented without contradiction by the truth of the doctrine of the divine creatio (q.v.): no finite creature can create from nothing. The ens perfectissimum (q.v.), God, who is ens (q.v.) in an absolute sense, is without analogy in the finite order and therefore transcends rather than contradicts the results of human reason. As ens perfectissimum, God can give being to the finite order and is therefore the single exception to the rule. In addition, the maxim does not claim Ex nihilo nihil creatur, Nothing is created out of nothing, but only Ex nihilo nihil generatur, Nothing is produced out of nothing. Christian doctrine never claims that nothing or nothingness is a positive source or ground of something but says only that God creates out of nothing or, in other words, creates all of existence, including the material substratum (see materia prima).

ex opere operantis: by the work of the worker; with reference to the sacraments, the assumption that a proper attitude of the recipient in the act of receiving a sacrament will lead to the bestowal of a grace beyond that received by the mere administration and receipt of the sacrament ex opere operato (q.v.). The concept of grace available ex opere operantis lies at the heart of the medieval system of merit (meritum, q.v.) and is denied by the Reformers and the Protestant orthodox.

ex opere operato: by the work performed; with reference to the sacraments, the assumption of medieval scholasticism and Roman Catholicism that the correct and churchly performance of the rite conveys grace to the recipient, unless the recipient places a spiritual impediment (obex, q.v.) in the way of grace. Sacraments themselves therefore have a virtus operativa (q.v.), or operative power. This view of sacraments is denied by both Lutherans and Reformed, who maintain that faith must be present in the recipient if the sacraments are to function as means of grace; the mere performance of the rite will not convey grace. See sacramentum.

ex pacto: through or on the basis of the pact or covenant; especially ex pacto divino: on the basis of the divine pact or covenant; a term related to the concept of a divine potentia ordinata (q.v.), indicating a divinely ordained or compacted offer of grace. The term derives from the Scotist and nominalist view of the efficacy of sacraments: the power of the sacrament lies, not in the elements, but in the promised divine work that occurs in and through the celebration. Reformed federal theology continued the use of the term, particularly with reference to the foedus operum (q.v.), to indicate the divine ordination of the terms upon which human beings might fulfill covenant obligations. The human acts of obedience required by the foedus operum were not in themselves deserving of eternal life but were considered efficacious ex pacto, on the basis of the agreement made by God. Although the conclusion would be denied by the Reformed scholastics, this view of the merit of Adam’s obedience approaches very closely the medieval concept of meritum de congruo (q.v.).

ex parte Dei: on the part of God; a term relating to the stipulations of the covenant relationship between God and man. Under the covenant certain promises are made ex parte Dei to be fulfilled contingent on acts of obedience performed ex parte hominis (q.v.), on the part of human beings. The two terms used in this manner, paired, indicate a two-sided, or reciprocal, covenant (foedus dipleuron, q.v.).

ex parte hominis: on the part of man. See ex parte Dei.

ex praemissis: from the premises or on grounds of the premises.

ex praevisa fide / propter praevisam fidem: through or on the basis of foreknown faith; synonymous with intuitu fidei (q.v.). See praevisa fides.

ex professo: by or on grounds of competence; a characterization of the arguments of someone who is an authority in a field of knowledge.

ex puris naturalibus: out of or according to the purely natural condition. See status purorum naturalium.

ex rerum natura: from the nature of things; from nature; specifically referencing inferences, arguments, or conclusions drawn from examination of the natural order, as distinct from purely rational argumentation. See in rerum natura; natura; res.

ex testamento: through or on the basis of the testament; i.e., the ordo salutis is made available to all people ex testamento, on the basis of the testament given in Christ. See ex pacto; testamentum.

ex voluntate: voluntarily.

exaequatio naturarum: an equalization of natures; viz., the result of a mixture and commingling of the divine and human natures in Christ such as was taught by the heretic Eutyches. The natures are confused, their integrity lost, and their idiomata (q.v.), or proper qualities, are merged, ultimately to the loss of the humanity in the infinitude of divinity. See atreptōs kai asynchytōs.

exclusivae particulae: exclusive particles. See particulae exclusivae.

excommunicatio: excommunication; church censure that refuses to the impenitent sinner participation in the Lord’s Supper and in the fellowship of the Christian community; the Reformed distinguish between excommunicatio minor, disciplinary exclusion from the Lord’s Supper, and excommunicatio maior, full exclusion from fellowship following admonition by the consistory and discussion of the offense in the congregation.

exemplar: exemplar, pattern, model. See causa exemplaris; forma; forma exemplaris; ideae divinae; universalia.

exemplaris: exemplary, serving as a pattern. See causa exemplaris; forma; forma exemplaris; ideae divinae; universalia.

exemplum: example; also, pessimum exemplum: the worst example.

exercitium: exercise; viz., the exercise or act of an ability or capacity either intellectual or physical; e.g., the exercise of understanding.

exercitium fidei: the exercise of faith. See perseverantia.

exinanitio: self-emptying, self-renunciation; viz., the Latin equivalent of the Greek term kenōsis (q.v.). Specifically, the exinanitio is the relinquishing of the forma Dei (q.v.), or form of God, by Christ and the assumption of the forma servi, or form of a servant, as witnessed by Philippians 2:5–7. This text marks a point of major exegetical and christological divergence between Lutheran and Reformed, particularly concerning the identification of the active subject (subiectum quod, q.v.) of the exinanitio. According to the Lutheran dogmaticians, the active subject of the exinanitio is the Incarnate Person of the Word. The incarnation itself is not, therefore, either humiliation or self-emptying, but the prior condition of both exinanitio and humiliatio. The exinanitio pertains to Christ’s human nature insofar as the divine majesty and its full use belong to Christ’s humanity in the personal union (see communicatio idiomatum), and therefore Christ relinquishes its exercise according to both natures. The Reformed, by way of contrast, identify the preincarnate Christ, the Logos asarkos (q.v.) and incarnandus (q.v.), as the subiectum quod of the exinanitio and therefore argue that the exinanitio consists in the relinquishment of divine glory, the forma Dei, by the Logos in its assumption of the flesh and the forma servi. See anthrōpopatheia; status humiliationis.

exitium: destruction, cause of destruction (from the verb exeo, to go away or pass away); a term typically used with reference to the exitium reproborum, the destruction of reprobates because of their sins, generally synonymous with the poena damni, the punishment of the damned, and not an indication of total or essential annihilation (annihilatio, q.v.). See damnatio; interitus mundi; poena; reprobatio.

exousia (ἐξουσία): the freedom or right to act, choose, or decide; thus ability, authority, or power. The Protestant scholastics use the term in both senses as an attribute of God, indicating the unconstrained power of God to act. It can also indicate human freedom of choice, which the scholastics call autexousion (q.v.).

expiatio: expiation; an act of making amends or of purging by sacrifice (piaculum, q.v.). Like satisfactio (q.v.), satisfaction, expiatio indicates an act performed because of an offense and directed toward the solution of the problem or toward payment of the debt incurred by the offense. Whereas expiatio indicates specifically a sacrificial act or a purgation, satisfactio has the connotation of payment or reparation that makes the offended party content or satisfied. See reconciliatio; satisfactio vicaria.

expromissio: surety, guarantee, specifically, an absolute surety as understood by the Voetians of Christ’s sponsio (q.v.), or suretyship, in the eternal covenant of redemption (pactum salutis, q.v.). See aphesis; fideiussio.

extra calvinisticum: the Calvinistic extra; a term used by the Lutherans to refer to the Reformed insistence on the utter transcendence of the Second Person of the Trinity in and during the incarnation. The Reformed argued that the Word is fully united to but never totally contained within the human nature and therefore, even in incarnation, is to be conceived of as beyond or outside of (extra) the human nature. In response to the Calvinistic extra, the Lutherans taught the maxim Logos non extra carnem (q.v.). It is clear that the so-called extra calvinisticum is not the invention of Calvinists but is a christological concept, safeguarding both the transcendence of Christ’s divinity and the integrity of Christ’s humanity, known to and used by the fathers of the first five centuries, including Athanasius and Augustine. It is also clear (1) that Reformed emphasis on the concept arose out of the tendency of Reformed Christology to teach a communicatio idiomatum (q.v.) in concreto over against the perceived Lutheran emphasis upon a communicatio idiomatum in abstracto and (2) that the polarization of Lutheran and Reformed Christologies owed much to the debate over the mode of Christ’s presence in the Lord’s Supper, in which the Lutherans emphasized the real but illocal presence of Christ’s body and blood by reason of the communicated omnipresence of the Logos (see praesentia illocalis sive definitiva) and the Reformed emphasized the transcendence of the divine and the heavenly location of Christ’s body. Against the Lutherans, the Reformed interpreted the extra calvinisticum in terms of the maxim Finitum non capax infiniti (q.v.), the finite is incapable of the infinite. In other words, the finite humanity of Christ is incapable of receiving or grasping infinite attributes such as omnipresence, omnipotence, or omniscience. See in abstracto; praesentia spiritualis sive virtualis; totus/totum; unio personalis.

Extra ecclesiam non sit salus: Outside of the church there may be no salvation; a maxim from Cyprian (Epistles 73.21) often cited by the scholastics, who accept it as true, with the provision that the church is identified as the communio sanctorum (q.v.), or communion of saints, and by its marks, Word and sacrament (see notae ecclesiae). The maxim is also frequently given as Extra ecclesiam nulla salus or Salus extra ecclesiam non est.

extra enthusiasticum: the enthusiastic extra; viz., the teaching of enthusiasts, fanatics, and proponents of the inner light that the grace of the Spirit operates extra Verbum, outside of the Word, and extra sacramentum, outside of the sacrament. The Lutheran orthodox accuse Zwingli of holding such a doctrine and, less correctly, because of Zwingli, allege it also against the Reformed orthodox. Unlike the Lutherans, the Reformed do allow an immediate work of the Spirit paralleling Word and sacrament, but they continue to affirm Word and sacrament as the chief means of grace.

extra mundum: outside of or beyond the world; applied to God as a synonym of immensitas, indicating that God, who does not occupy space, is present in but not confined by the world.

extra muros ecclesiae: outside of the walls of the church; a characterization of unbelievers.