Theopedia

Sola Fide

“For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.”

— Romans 3:28 (ESV)

Definition

Sola Fide (Latin for “faith alone”) is the doctrine that a sinner is justified, declared righteous before God, through faith alone, apart from any works of his own, because that faith receives the righteousness Christ himself accomplished.1 The formula excludes not gross merit alone but any contribution whatsoever to justification, since faith itself justifies only as the empty hand that receives a gift already complete, not as a virtue God rewards.2

Confessional Witness

The doctrine is the settled teaching of the Reformation’s confessions, not a single tradition’s distinctive. The Westminster Shorter Catechism defines justification as “an act of God’s free grace, wherein he pardoneth all our sins, and accepteth us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.”3 The Second Helvetic Confession (1566) states the same doctrine under its own heading, “We are justified by faith alone”:

“We therefore teach and believe with the apostle that sinful man is justified by faith alone in Christ, not by the law or any works… we attribute it wholly to the grace of God in Christ through faith.”1

The 1689 Second London Baptist Confession states the same exclusivity: those God effectually calls, he freely justifies, “not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins, and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous,” imputing to them “Christ’s active obedience unto the whole law, and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves; it is the gift of God.”4

Biblical Basis

Paul states the doctrine as a settled conclusion rather than an inference: “we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law” (Rom. 3:28), and he grounds it in Abraham’s own justification, “to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Rom. 4:5). Galatians states the same exclusivity against a rival gospel of law-keeping: “a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ… because by works of the law no one will be justified” (Gal. 2:16). Ephesians ties faith itself to grace rather than human effort, “by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Eph. 2:8-9).

Historical Development

The Reformation controversy turned on whether faith alone could justify without love or good works accompanying it as a further cause. Rome’s answer came at the Council of Trent (1547), which allowed that “we are said to be justified by faith, because faith is the beginning of human salvation, the foundation and the root of all justification,” while denying that faith alone, apart from the works that follow it, is sufficient.5 J. I. Packer describes what stood behind the Reformers’ insistence on the stricter formula: their concern was not justification by faith alone in isolation but “the sinner’s entire salvation… by free and sovereign grace only,” of which faith alone in justification was one expression, “important to them because it safeguarded the principle of sovereign grace.”6 Herman Bavinck states plainly why the Reformed tradition treated the doctrine as decisive rather than one topic among many: “Justification is the doctrine on which the church stands or falls.”2

Opposing Views

Roman Catholic theology holds that justification includes, not merely follows, the sinner’s own inward renewal. The Council of Trent’s canons anathematize anyone who says “that righteousness received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works,” treating those works as more than the fruit of a completed justification, and anyone who denies that “the justified man, by the good works which he performs through the grace of God and the merit of Jesus Christ… truly merit[s] increase of grace, eternal life.”7 On this framework, faith begins the process of justification, but the grace- enabled good works that follow are themselves a further, genuine ground of a person’s standing before God, not simply its evidence.

Objections and Responses

Doesn’t excluding works from justification contradict James, who says a person “is justified by works and not by faith alone” (James 2:24)? Reformed theology answers that James and Paul are not disputing the same question. Paul addresses how a sinner is declared righteous before God; James addresses how a professed faith is shown to be genuine before other people, arguing that a faith producing no works at all is not living faith but a dead one (James 2:17, 26). The works James requires are the fruit that authenticates justifying faith, not an additional ground of justification alongside it.

If faith alone justifies apart from works, what stops the doctrine from encouraging moral indifference? Paul raises and rejects exactly this inference: “Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means!” (Rom. 6:1-2). The Reformed answer distinguishes the ground of justification from its fruit: faith alone justifies, but the faith that justifies is never alone, since the same union with Christ that secures a sinner’s righteous standing also secures his ongoing sanctification.2

Related Doctrines

References

  1. The Second Helvetic Confession (1566), chap. 15, “Of the True Justification of the Faithful”: “We therefore teach and believe with the apostle that sinful man is justified by faith alone in Christ, not by the law or any works… Therefore, we do not share in the benefit of justification partly because of the grace of God or Christ, and partly because of ourselves, our love, works or merit, but we attribute it wholly to the grace of God in Christ through faith.” ↩ ↩2

  2. Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics: Abridged in One Volume, ed. John Bolt (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011), chap. 20, “Justification, Sanctification, and Perseverance”: “Justification is the doctrine on which the church stands or falls.” ↩ ↩2 ↩3

  3. Charles Hodge, “Chapter XVII. Justification,” in Systematic Theology, Volume III (New York: Charles Scribner and Company, 1873), 113, quoting the Westminster Shorter Catechism. ↩

  4. The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689), chap. 11, “Of Justification,” paras. 1, 3. ↩

  5. Council of Trent, Sixth Session (1547), “Decree on Justification,” chap. 8, quoted in Archibald Alexander Hodge, Outlines of Theology (New York: Robert Carter and Brothers, 1879), 513. ↩

  6. J. I. Packer, quoted in Matthew Michael Barrett, “Monergism in the Calvinist Tradition,” in “Reclaiming Monergism: The Case for Sovereign Grace in Effectual Calling and Regeneration” (PhD diss., The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2011), 58-59. ↩

  7. Council of Trent, Sixth Session (1547), “Canons Concerning Justification,” canons 24 and 32, quoted in A. A. Hodge, Outlines of Theology, 513. ↩