And for this cause God shall send them strong
delusion,
&c.] Or "efficacy of error", which God may be said to send;
and the Alexandrian copy reads, "does send"; because it is not a
bare permission but a voluntary one; or it is his will that error
should be that truth may be tried, and be illustrated by its
contrary, and shine the more through the force of opposition to
it; and that those which are on the side of it might be made
manifest, as well as that the rejecters of the Gospel might be
punished; for the efficacy of error is not to be considered as a
sin, of which God cannot be the author, but as a punishment for
sin, and to which men are given up, and fall under the power of,
because they receive not the love of the truth, which is the
reason here given: and this comes to pass partly through God's
denying his grace, or withholding that light and knowledge, by
which error may be discovered and detected; and by taking from
men the knowledge and conscience of things they had, see (
Romans 1:28 )
. So that they call evil good, and good evil, and do not appear
to have the common sense and reason of mankind, at least do not
act according to it; and by giving them up to judicial blindness
and hardness of heart, and to the god of this world, to blind
their minds; and without this it is not to be accounted for, that
the followers of antichrist should give into such senseless
notions as those of transubstantiation, works of supererogation,
or into such stupid practices as worshipping of images, praying
to saints departed, and paying such a respect to the pretended
relics of saints, as they do; but a spirit of slumber is given
them, and eyes that they should not see, and ears that they
should not hear, because of their rejection of the Gospel: and
that they should believe a lie;
that the pope is Christ's vicar on earth, and has power to
forgive sins; that the bread and wine in the Lord's supper are
transubstantiated into the very body and blood of Christ; with
other lying tenets spoken in hypocrisy concerning good works,
merit, pardon, penance; &c. with a multitude of lying wonders
and false miracles, of which their legends are full; and this is
the first and more near end of strong delusion or efficacious
error being sent them; the more remote and ultimate one follows.