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The Thirty-Nine Articles · Article 11 of 39

Article XI. Of the Justification of Man

We are accounted righteous before God, only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by Faith, and not for our own works or deservings: Wherefore, that we are justified by Faith only is a most wholesome Doctrine, and very full of comfort, as more largely is expressed in the Homily of Justification.

Latin text (1563)

Articulus XI. De Hominis Iustificatione.

Tantùm propter meritum Domini ac Seruatoris nostri Iesu Christi, per fidem, non propter opera et merita nostra, iusti coram Deo reputamur: Quare sola fide nos iustificari, doctrina est saluberrima, ac consolationis plenissima: ut in Homilia de Iustificatione hominis fusiùs explicatur.

Source: the first printed Latin edition (London: Reginald Wolfe, 1563), as given in Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom, vol. 3 (1877), via CCEL. Original spelling kept.

Commentaries

Article-by-Article commentaries on Article XI, oldest first.

  1. Thomas Rogers, The Faith, Doctrine, and Religion, Professed, & Protected in the Realme of England (first published 1585 as The English Creede; 1607 ed.)
  2. John Ellis, A Defense of the Thirty Nine Articles of the Church of England (first published in Latin 1660; 1700 English ed.)
  3. Gilbert Burnet, An Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England (first published 1699; 1700 2nd ed.)
  4. William Beveridge, Ecclesia Anglicana Ecclesia Catholica; or, The Doctrine of the Church of England Consonant to Scripture, Reason, and Fathers (written before 1708; 1846–47 ed.)
  5. Edward Welchman, The Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England, Illustrated with Notes (first published in Latin 1713; 1790 English ed.)
  6. Anonymous, A Practical Exposition upon the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England (1716)
  7. John Veneer, An Exposition on the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England (first published 1725; 1734 2nd ed.)
  8. Martin Madan, A Scriptural Comment upon the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England (1772)
  9. John Hey, Lectures in Divinity, Book IV (1796–98)
  10. George Pretyman Tomline, Elements of Christian Theology, vol. 2 (first published 1799; 1818 ed.)
  11. William Wilson, The Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England, Illustrated by Copious Extracts from the Liturgy, Homilies, Nowell’s Catechism, and Jewell’s Apology (1821)
  12. Thomas R. Jones, An Exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles by the Reformers (1849)
  13. William Trollope, Questions and Answers on the XXXIX Articles of the Church of England (1850)
  14. Edward Harold Browne, An Exposition of the Thirty-nine Articles, Historical and Doctrinal (first published 1850–53; 1895 printing)
  15. Alexander Penrose Forbes, An Explanation of the Thirty-Nine Articles (first published 1867–68; 1871 2nd ed.)
  16. Thomas Pownall Boultbee, A Commentary on the Thirty-Nine Articles (first published 1871; 1877 ed.)
  17. George Frederick Maclear and Watkin Wynn Williams, An Introduction to the Articles of the Church of England (1895)
  18. E. Tyrrell Green, The Thirty-Nine Articles and the Age of the Reformation (1896)
  19. Edgar Charles Sumner Gibson, The Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England, Explained with an Introduction (1896–97)
  20. Bernard C. Jackson, The Thirty-Nine Articles: A Short Exposition (1900)
  21. Edward John Bicknell, A Theological Introduction to the Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England (1919)

Historical context

Article XI states the doctrine at the centre of the Reformation controversy: that sinners are accounted righteous before God only for the merit of Christ, by faith, and not for their own works or deservings. Luther and the continental reformers had made justification by faith the decisive issue with Rome. The Council of Trent answered in its Decree on Justification (Session VI, 1547), which taught that justification includes inward renewal and condemned the claim that the sinner is justified by faith alone (canon 9). In England, Cranmer's Forty-Two Articles of 1553 already declared that "justification by only faith in Jesus Christ, in that sense as it is declared in the Homily of Justification, is a most certain and wholesome doctrine for Christians." When the Articles were revised under Archbishop Parker in 1563, the Article was recast in its present form, adding the opening statement that we are accounted righteous only for the merit of Christ. The homily it names is the third in the First Book of Homilies (1547), "Of the Salvation of Mankind," usually attributed to Cranmer.

Sources: C. Hardwick, A History of the Articles of Religion (1851); E. C. S. Gibson, The Thirty-Nine Articles (1896); E. H. Browne, An Exposition of the Thirty-Nine Articles (1865); Council of Trent, Session VI (1547).