Active Obedience

Definition and Meaning

Active obedience (Latin obedientia activa) refers to the obedience by which Jesus Christ, during His life as a man, kept the law of God in every respect. Its counterpart, passive obedience (obedientia passiva), refers to Christ's suffering and death as He bore the penalty for sin in the place of sinners. Here "passive" does not mean inactive; it means "suffering" (from the Latin passio).

Reformed theology explains justification (God's declaration that a sinner is righteous) in two parts. Through passive obedience the penalty for sin is paid, and the righteousness accomplished through active obedience is imputed (that is, what belongs to another is reckoned as one's own) to those who believe. This account is tied to the framework of covenant theology, in which the first man, Adam, failed to keep the covenant of works, and Christ, as the "second Adam," fulfilled its demands.

Biblical and Historical Background

Passages cited in support of this doctrine include Romans 5:18–19 ("so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous"); Galatians 4:4, which speaks of Christ as "made under the law"; Matthew 3:15 ("thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness"); and Hebrews 5:7–9, which says that He "learned … obedience by the things which he suffered."

John Calvin taught that Christ accomplished redemption through the obedience of His whole life. In the late sixteenth century, the German Reformed theologian Johannes Piscator argued that only passive obedience is imputed, sparking controversy. The Westminster Confession of Faith (11.1) states that God justifies by "imputing the obedience and satisfaction of Christ." Whether this wording can be read as teaching the imputation of active obedience remains disputed among scholars today. Later, the Congregationalist Savoy Declaration (1658) and the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith explicitly affirmed the imputation of both active and passive obedience. Since the late twentieth century, the emergence of the New Perspective on Paul and related developments has prompted ongoing reexamination of the doctrine of imputation itself.

Practice in Korean Churches

The term is not frequently used in preaching; it is addressed mainly in systematic theology courses at theological seminaries and in doctrinal instruction.

• Presbyterian: Theologians in Presbyterian churches that follow the Westminster Standards, especially in denominations that emphasize the Reformed tradition, generally teach the imputation of active obedience as an important element of justification. They differ, however, in their emphasis regarding its scope and formulation.
• Methodist and Holiness: Denominations that follow Wesleyan theology likewise confess that the righteousness of Christ is received by faith. They do not, however, place this distinction at the center of their doctrine, and they tend to emphasize sanctification alongside justification.
• Baptist: Baptists of Reformed persuasion teach the imputation of active obedience on the basis of the 1689 Confession. Baptists as a whole, however, hold no single unified position.

Since the 2000s, debates over the doctrine of justification in Korea have also brought the question of the imputation of active obedience into discussion in theological circles.