Classical Arminianism and Total Depravity

In this post, I would like to explore similarities and differences in how classical Arminians and Calvinists view the doctrine of total depravity.  I say "classical Arminianism" because many people who claim to be Arminian do not understand Arminianism as it was stated by Arminius himself.  For example, the following website does NOT speak for the classical Arminian:

http://thegracecommunity.wordpress.com/2011/05/16/what-is-arminianism/

Free-will or human ability. ...Each sinner possesses a free will, and his eternal destiny depends on how he uses it. Man’s freedom consists in his ability to choose good over evil in spiritual matters; his will is not enslaved to his sinful nature. The sinner has the power to either cooperate with God’s Spirit and be regenerated or resist God’s grace and perish. The lost sinner needs the Spirit’s assistance but he does not have to be regenerated by the Spirit before he can believe, for faith is man’s act and precedes the new birth. Faith is the sinner’s gift to God; it is man’s contribution to salvation. (emphasis mine)

I understand why Calvinists react so strongly to these portrayals of Arminian theology.  Contrary to the quote above Arminius did not believe that faith is the sinner's gift to God.  Nor did he maintain that man's will, in his fallen state, is free from enslavement to sin.  In his book Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities, Roger Olson writes the following:

Arminius could not have made clearer his belief that human beings are utterly helpless and totally dependent on grace for their salvation.

Roger E. Olson. Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (p. 142). Kindle Edition. 

The classical Arminian does not believe that a man has the ability to respond to God apart from a special act of grace.  Man cannot, by means of his natural free will, please God.  Man cannot, by means of common grace, choose to accept God's offer of salvation.  Arminius held that a special act of grace is required in order to free man's will from enslavement to sin.  Thus, contrary to popular opinion, Arminius did not think that man could save himself by means of his autonomous choice.  In fact, Arminius believed that even after regeneration a man must be carried by grace in order to do any good in the sight of God.  Olson quotes Arminius in the following passage:

I ascribe to grace THE COMMENCEMENT, THE CONTINUANCE AND THE CONSUMMATION OF ALL GOOD,-and to such an extent do I carry its influence, that a man, though already regenerate, can neither conceive, will nor do any good at all, nor resist any evil temptation, without this preventing and exciting, this following and co-operating grace-From this statement it will clearly appear, that I am by no means injurious or unjust to grace, by attributing, as it is reported of me, too much to man's free-will...

Roger E. Olson. Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (pp. 143-144). Kindle Edition. 

Or again concerning free will Arminius writes:

Free will is unable to begin or to perfect any true and spiritual good, without Grace. That I may not be said, like Pelagius, to practice delusion with regard to the word "Grace," I mean by it that which is the Grace of Christ and which belongs to regeneration.... I confess that the mind of [animalis] a natural and carnal man is obscure and dark, that his affections are corrupt and inordinate, that his will is stubborn and disobedient, and that the man himself is dead in sins.

Roger E. Olson. Arminian Theology: Myths and Realities (p. 144). Kindle Edition. 

Suffice it to say that Arminius did not think that man, in his fallen state apart from grace, could accept God's offer of salvation.

Additionally, the classical Arminian notion of total depravity is very close to the Calvinist notion.  One Calvinist website writes the following description of total depravity:

http://www.reformed.org/calvinism/index.html?mainframe=/calvinism/index_calv.html

When Calvinists speak of humans as "totally depraved," they are making an extensive, rather than an intensive statement. The effect of the fall upon man is that sin has extended to every part of his personality -- his thinking, his emotions, and his will. Not necessarily that he is intensely sinful, but that sin has extended to his entire being.  The unregenerate (unsaved) man is dead in his sins (Romans 5:12). Without the power of the Holy Spirit, the natural man is blind and deaf to the message of the gospel (Mark 4:11f). This is why Total Depravity has also been called "Total Inability."

A classical Arminian would not disagree with this description of total depravity.  In fact, the Society of Evangelical Arminians describes it in nearly the same way.  Arminians believe in original sin and that sin extends to every part of man.  These are not the points of disagreement between the two views of the nature of fallen man.

Where the two views diverge are as follows:

1. While grace is necessary for salvation, grace is not irresistible.  Man can resist the prevenient grace of God.
2. While man does not have the ability to respond to God, once enabled by prevenient grace his will is freed (but not necessitated) to accept God's offer of salvation.
3. The act of regeneration is synergistic in that there are two agents involved.  Arminians don't believe that man can earn his salvation via good works, but that he may agree with God (and accept God's gracious gift) once his will has been freed by grace.
4. Despite claims made by Calvinists, the acceptance of God's offer (enabled by God's grace) is not a meritorious act.

Arminianism is decidedly synergistic, but the picture painted by Calvinists often misses the mark of what Classical Arminians affirm when they affirm synergy.  In an article by John Hendryx, synergism is defined in the following way:

Synergism is the doctrine that the act of being born again is achieved through a combination of human will and divine grace.

This appears to be a minimal definition of synergism.  However, Calvinists often imply much more about synergism than what is found in this "minimal" definition.  In the same article, John Hendryx writes,

In other words, synergists believe that faith itself, a principle standing independent and autonomous of God's action of grace, is something the natural man must add or contribute toward the price of his salvation. Unregenerate man, in this scheme, is left to his freewill and natural ability to believe or reject God. Synergists teach that God's grace takes us part of the way to salvation but that the [fallen, rebellious] human will must determine the final outcome. It does this by reaching down into an autonomous principle within in its fallen unrenewed nature in order to either produce a right thought or create a right volition toward God. ...In this system, then, grace is merely an offer or a help but does not do anything to change man's heart of stone or natural hostility to God. This means that God will only look favorably upon and reward those natural men who are able to produce or contribute faith, independent of God's inward gracious call or spiritual renewal. (emphasis his).

While this characterization may reflect the views of some synergists, it does NOT reflect the view of Arminius himself or those who are faithful to his teachings.  Additionally, synergism as such, does not necessitate that God and man contribute equally to salvation.  What is more, a syergistic view as such does not necessitate that man contribute anything towards the "price of his salvation".  Minimally it simply means that two agents are involved in the process of salvation.  Even if one of the agents is almost entirely passive, synergism is minimally the claim that there are two agents involved as opposed to one agent.

Hendryx's characterization of Arminians fails in at least the following ways:

For classical Arminians,

1. Faith is not independent of God's grace, but entirely dependent on and enabled by God's grace.
2. Natural man does not contribute or add anything towards the "price of his salvation".
3. Unregenerate man, in this scheme, is NOT left to his freewill and natural ability to believe or reject God.  Unregenerate man, apart from grace, cannot believe God.
4. Grace is NOT merely an offer of salvation.  Prevenient grace is precisely that special act of grace that enables man to agree with God.
5. God does NOT look favorably upon and reward those natural men who are able to produce or contribute faith, independent of God's inward gracious call or spiritual renewal.  Faith does not come apart from God's grace, nor is faith a contribution on the part of man.  Rather faith is a gift from God that man (under the enabling power of grace) either resists or does not resist.

The narrative of personal salvation that the Arminian has in mind goes something like this.  Man left to himself will follow his sinful nature.  He is a slave to his own sinful nature and does not have the ability to know God or please God.  God in His goodness enables a man, by means of a special act of grace called prevenient grace, to see the goodness of God for what it is.  In so doing, God makes it possible for man to respond to God.  However, man can resist this prevenient grace and so condemn himself to death.

Thus, for the classical Arminian, man is depraved.  He cannot respond to God on his own.  Every part of his being is marked by falleness.  However, the classical Arminian rejects the narrative of personal salvation given by the Calvinist because he thinks that the deterministic claims of the Calvinists are unnecessary for explaining the goodness and sovereignty of God.  In fact, the Arminian thinks that the Calvinist narrative of salvation unnecessarily diminishes the goodness of God.  It is this concern, primarily, that draws the Arminian to the thought of Arminius.