Institutes 4.14.2 — OF THE SACRAMENTS.

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**OF THE SACRAMENTS.**

The reason why the ancients used the term in this sense is not obscure. The old interpreter, whenever he wished to render the Greek term μυστήριον into Latin, especially when it was used with reference to divine things, used the word sacramentum . Thus, in Ephesians, “Having made known unto us the mystery ( sacramentum ) of his will;” and again, “If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God, which is given me to you-wards, how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery” ( sacramentum ) ( Eph. 1:9 ; 3:2). In the Colossians, “Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but is now made manifest to his saints, to whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery” ( sacramentum ) ( Col. 1:26 ). Also in the First Epistle to Timothy, “Without controversy, great is the mystery ( sacramentum ) of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh” ( 1 Tim. 3:16 ). He was unwilling to use the word arcanum (secret), lest the word should seem beneath the magnitude of the thing meant. When the thing, therefore, was sacred and secret, he used the term sacramentum . In this sense it frequently occurs in ecclesiastical writers. And it is well known, that what the Latins call sacramenta , the Greeks call μυστήρια (mysteries). The sameness of meaning removes all dispute. Hence it is that the term was applied to those signs which gave an august representation of things spiritual and sublime. This is also observed by Augustine, “It were tedious to discourse of the variety of signs; those which relate to divine things are called sacraments” (August. Ep. 5 . ad Marcell.).

Source

• source-manifest/institutes — Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, tr. Beveridge 1845 (PD)
• evidence_grade: D_doctrinal_textbook