Osborne on "Calvinists"

Last March I emailed Grant Osborne in inquiry. Since he never responded, I'm posting my inquiry here:

Dear Dr. Osborne,

In your response to Buist Fanning (in Four Views on the Warning Passages in Hebrews), you refer to “the better recent Calvinist interpreters (Hughes, Lane, Guthrie, Ellingworth, Carson, Fanning)” (232). And back on p220 you refer to “several of the best Calvinist commentaries, like Lane and Ellingworth.”

I’m puzzled by your classification:

1. What makes you think Ellingworth is a Calvinist? What did he say in his exegesis of Heb 6 & 10 to suggest to you that he’s a Calvinist?

2. What makes you think Hughes is a Calvinist? What did he say in his exegesis of Heb 6 & 10 to suggest to you that he’s a Calvinist?

I believe that early on, Hughes was a Calvinist. But he repudiated Calvinism in his later book The True Image.

And while he was, for a time, a visiting prof. at WTS, that institution discontinued his services when he came out with The True Image.

3. I’m especially puzzled by why you’d classify Lane as a Calvinist. He clearly defends the Arminian interpretation of Heb 6 & 10 in his commentary. What did he say in his exegesis of Heb 6 & 10 to suggest to you that he’s a Calvinist?

Over and above his commentary, Lane was dean of the religion dept. at SPU, an institution affiliated with the Free Methodist Church. And after he stepped down from the deanship, he became the Paul T. Walls Professor of Wesleyan and Biblical Studies. Doesn't look like the resume of a Calvinist.

So what’s the basis of your classification?

Steve Hays