This study examines the relationship between scriptural authority and the life of faith in the prominent English Reformed orthodox theologian, John Owen. While aspects of Owen’s argument have caught the attention of scholars across a relatively diverse range of fields, no full-length historical treatment of this theme has yet appeared, and many of its distinctive features remain unexplored. The thesis particularly seeks to show how Owen creatively drew upon an ‘ecumenical’ dogmatic and metaphysical heritage to restate and refine the traditional Reformed position on scriptural authority, sensitive to intellectual developments in his own late seventeenth-century context. The broader intention is to enrich the expanding scholarly interest in Owen’s thought, alongside Puritan, Reformed orthodox thought in general, and also, perhaps, to serve as a resource for those approaching this general subject from other disciplines. The thesis concentrates on Owen’s Reason of Faith (1677), in conversation with his wider mature corpus. After an introduction which presents the background and parameters for the study, chapter 2 introduces the central themes of Reason of Faith. It points to Owen’s engagement with contemporary apologists and their deleterious reliance on well-worn rational arguments or ‘evidences’ as the foundation for faith. Chapters 3, 4 and 5 examine Owen’s own constructive position. While recognising and incorporating the value of ‘objective evidence’ in faith, Owen offers his own critical reformulation that preserves the integrity of faith as something resting exclusively on divine testimony. Chapters 3 and 4 focus upon the role of subjective divine illumination in the perception of natural truths (chapter 3), and the gracious truths revealed in scripture (chapter 4), noting especially Owen’s use of habitual terminology derived from scholastic thought. Chapter 5 examines the critical function of scripture’s ‘light’ and ‘power’ as the divine ‘evidence’ or ‘objective testimony’ which appeals uniquely to the regenerated and elevated faculties, and secures faith. The chapter also aims to observe how Owen relates this authority to important christological and redemptive themes emerging elsewhere in his thought, not least the restored ‘image of God’. The final two chapters shift attention to related features of scripture. Honouring the essentially confessional nature of scripture’s authority, chapter 6 shows how Owen locates scripture within a covenantal frame, drawing upon a traditional account of inspiration. Chapter 7 explores the relationship Owen sees between scriptural authority and perspicuity, which enables an immediate, ongoing relationship between the rule of Christ and his church, and regulates the way it is read and understood by believers using the means of grace. The conclusion summarises Owen’s unique contribution to the Reformed consensus on scriptural authority in the face of an increasing fragmentation of confessional orthodoxy on this issue. Three compact appendices are added: Appendix A discusses Owen’s reliance on peripatetic cognitive metaphysics; Appendix B provides a survey of key historical developments in the Augustinian doctrine of natural illumination; Appendix C addresses some historiographical problems pertaining to inspiration in Reformed orthodoxy and Owen in particular.

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This thesis is an attempt to remedy the neglect of John Owen's atonement theology despite wide acclaim for him as the leading representative of the Reformed doctrine of limited atonement. Its main proposition is that Owen's conception of Christ's priesthood in terms of Christ's united acts of oblation and intercession, performed in his twofold state of humiliation and exaltation, lies at the heart of his atonement theology. Chapter One surveys the current literature on Owen and sets out the method and scope of the thesis. A case study of Owen's main constructive work on the atonement, Salus Electorum Sanguis Jesu, or The Death of Death in the Death of Christ (1647), yields the finding that his atonement theology is built around three doctrinal loci: the triune God, Christ the Mediator, and the doctrine of sin's satisfaction. These loci establish the scope of the thesis and are reflected in the content of the ensuing chapters. Chapter Two examines Owen's view of the triune God as the Agent of redemption in the context of the Reformed orthodox teaching on the works of God (opera Dei). Owen is found to be thoroughly trinitarian in his application of the principles inherent in the trinitarian orthodoxy of the West to his conception of the covenant of redemption (pactum salutis). Concern for Christ's priestly mediation understood in the context of his twofold state dominates his exposition of this covenant. Chapters Three to Five explore Owen's understanding of Christ's mediatorial work as the means of redemption. Chapter Three examines Christ's mediatorial office in general. It reveals the distinctively Reformed character of Owen's Christology and his use of the mediatorial category to expound it. Chapter Four narrows the focus to Christ's priestly office. The central importance of Christ's priesthood is shown from three vantage points: Owen's reading of the state of controversy with his universalist opponents; an examination of the views of his universalist opponents; the development of Owen's formulation of Christ's priesthood in his early and mature writings. Chapter Five probes the significance of Owen's formulation of Christ's priesthood in his understanding of sin's satisfaction. The bearing of his formulation is seen in his decision for the satisfactory value of Christ's whole obedience and in his explication of the nature and fruits of Christ's death. In the final chapter, Owen's understanding of the end of redemption is examined in its twofold form: the ultimate end of God's glory and the intermediate end of the elect's salvation. Owen's exposition of both areas reveals, once again, the central importance of Christ's priesthood.

Scholarship has tended to depict John Owen as a “Reformed catholic” attempting a synthesis of Reformed principles with a largely Thomist doctrine of God. In this thesis, I argue that this depiction risks losing sight of those aspects of Owen's doctrine of God that are intended to support a distinctly Protestant account of the economy of grace. By an examination of the principles of divine government, I argue that Owen employs the theme of God's “dominion” in order to establish the freedom and gratuity of God's grace, and to resist theologies that might otherwise use the doctrine of creation to structure and norm God's government of creatures. In chapter one, I argue against prevailing readings of Owen's thought that his theology of the divine will is, in fact, “voluntarist” in nature, prioritizing God's will over his intellect in the determination of the divine decree. I show that Owen regards God's absolute dominion as an entailment of his ontological priority over creatures. Chapters two and three examine the character of God's dominion over creatures in virtue of their “two-fold dependence” upon him as both Creator and Lawgiver. Chapter four takes up Owen's theology of God's remunerative justice in the context of his covenant theology. I show here that his doctrine of divine dominion underwrites his critique of merit-theology and attempts to establish the gratuity of that supernatural end to which humans are destined. Finally, in chapter five, I examine the principles of God's mercy, expressed in the work of redemption, where I demonstrate how Owen's conception of divine dominion underwrites the freedom of God in election and his account of particular redemption.