ANTINOMIANISM, the name applied to the doctrine that the dispensation of grace as set forth in the New Testament frees the Christian from the claims and obligations of the moral law as presented in the Old Testa ment. In the early Church there were anti nomian tendencies due to an over-emphasis of faith in opposition to works. This is especially so in some of the Gnostic systems, where faith and love are so emphasized and moral matters appear indifferent, and the contradictions be tween the law and the gospel are regarded as irreconcilable. Antinomianism marked many of the mediaeval sects, but reached its fullest de velopment in the Reformation period. In Luther's emphasis on the doctrine of justifica tion by faith he had used expressions which might be understood to indicate opposition be tween the law of Moses and the gospel, as though with the establishment of the gospel the law of Moses was no longer of any value. But
when Luther carefully expressed himself on this point, as he did in his instruction to the Saxon preachers in 1527, he gave to the teach ings of the Old Testament their proper place in the Christian life. This was disputed by Agricola, and a controversy broke out between him and Luther, in which he treated Luther's most extreme statements in regard to faith as though they were to be taken literally. His follower Amsdorf went as far as to say that good works were detrimental to salvation. In England there were Antinomians in the various sects in the time of Cromwell. They were high Calvinists and claimed that, as the elect cannot fall from grace, any act performed by them, however sinful it may seem to men, is not in reality sinful.