sb. and a. Theol. [f. mod.L. suprālapsārius, f. suprā SUPRA- 8 + L. lapsus fall, LAPSE: see -IAN. Cf. F. supralapsaire.]
A. sb. A name applied to those Calvinists who held the view that, in the divine decrees, the predestination of some to eternal life and of others to eternal death was antecedent to the creation and the fall: opposed to INFRALAPSARIAN.
1633. Hoard, Gods Love to Mankind, 13. The Maintainers of the Absolute Decree do say … eyther that all actions … and all events … are absolutely necessary; so the Supralapsarians: or that all mens ends (at least) are unalterable and indeterminable by the power of their wills; so the Sublapsarians.
1674. Hickman, Quinquart. Hist. (ed. 2), 75. I believe, with the Supralapsarian, that God hath decreed, not to bestow converting Grace upon many whom he could easily (had he so pleased) have converted.
1674. Boyle, Excell. Theol., I. i. 50. Some few Theologues … have got the name of Supralapsarians, for venturing to look back beyond the fall of Adam for God’s decrees of election and reprobation.
1797. Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3), XVIII. 84/1. According to the supralapsarians, the object of predestination is, homo creabilis et labilis; and, according to the sublapsarians and infralapsarians, homo creatus et lapsus.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., iii. I. 400. The young candidate for academical honours … was strictly interrogated by a synod of louring Supralapsarians as to the day and hour when he experienced the new birth.
B. adj. Of or pertaining to the Supralapsarians or their doctrine; that is a Supralapsarian.
1633. Hoard, God’s Love to Mankind, 2. The rest of that side, thinking to avoyd the great inconveniences, to which that supralapsarian way lyeth open,… present man to God in his decree of Reprobation, lying in the fall.
1733. Neal, Hist. Purit., II. 79. A treatise of Beza’s upon the Supralapsarian scheme of Predestination.
1764. Maclaine, trans. Mosheim’s Eccl. Hist., XVII. (1833), 639/1. The Supralapsarian and Subslapsarian divines forgot their debates and differences.
1831. Macaulay, Ess., Pilgr. Progr. (1897), 191. An absurd allegory written by some raving supralapsarian preacher who was dissatisfied with the mild theology of the Pilgrim’s Progress.
1839. Hallam, Lit. Eur., III. ii. § 32. The Supra-lapsarian tenets of Calvin.
1885. Encycl. Brit., XIX. 670/2. The supralapsarian view was … adopted by Beza and other Calvinists, as it had been held by some of the Augustinian schoolmen.
Hence Supralapsarianism (cf. mod.L. suprālapsāriismus], the doctrine of the Supralapsarians. So † Supralapsary sb. and a. = SUPRALAPSARIAN.
1728. Chambers, Cycl., Supralapsary, in Theology, a Person who holds, that God, without any Regard to the good or evil Works of Men, has resolv’d, by an eternal Decree, to save some, and damn others.
1755. Johnson, Supralapsary, antecedent to the fall of man.
1775. Ash, Supralapsarianism.
1841. J. Evans’ Sk. Denom. Chr. World, 73. Recent divines, who have gone to the height of Supralapsarianism.
1874. Green, Short Hist., viii. § 1. 458. Whitgift strove to force on the Church the supralapsarianism of his Lambeth Articles.
