07095.1 - Analysis of The Confession - 1

§95.1. Analysis of the Westminster Confession -Part 1.

SOURCES. The Westminster Confession sets forth the Calvinistic system in its scholastic maturity after it had passed through the sharp conflict with Arminianism in Holland, and as it had shaped itself in the minds of Scotch Presbyterians and English Puritans during their conflict with High-Church prelacy. The leading ideas, with the exception of the theory of the Christian Sabbath, were of Continental growth, but the form was entirely English. The framers of the Confession were no doubt quite familiar with Continental theology; Latin was then still the theological language; the Arminian controversy had excited the greatest attention in England, and agitated the pulpit and the press for years; the English Church was well represented at the Synod of Dort; several divines of the Assembly had spent some time in Holland, where they found a hospitable refuge from persecution under Charles I., and were treated with great respect by the Dutch ministers and divines. [SeeNote #1463] But while the Confession had the benefit of the Continental theology, and embodied the results of the Arminian controversy, it was not framed on the model of any Continental Confession, nor of the earlier Scottish Confessions, notwithstanding the presence and influence of the Commissioners from the Church of Scotland. On the contrary, it kept in the track of the English Articles of Religion, which the Assembly was at first directed to revise, and with which it was essentially agreed. It wished to carry on that line of development which was begun, several years before the Arminian controversy, by the framers of the Lambeth Articles (1595), and which was continued by Archbishop Ussher in the Irish Articles (1615). [SeeNote #1464] It is a Calvinistic completion and sharper logical statement of the doctrinal system of the Thirty-nine Articles, which stopped with the less definite Augustinian scheme, and left a considerable margin for different interpretations. In point of theological ability and fullness it is far superior to its predecessors. The Westminster Confession agrees more particularly with the Articles which were adopted by the Protestant Church in Ireland, but afterwards set aside by Archbishop Laud through the Earl of Strafford. This is manifest in the order and arrangement, in the titles of chapters, in phraseology, and especially in the most characteristic features of Calvin’s theology-the doctrine of Predestination and of the Sacraments. The resemblance is so striking that it must have been intended for the purpose of showing the essential agreement of the Assembly with the doctrinal standards of the English and Irish Reformation. Ussher himself had pursued the same course and incorporated in his work the substance of the English Articles and the full text of the Lambeth Articles. He was a doctrinal Puritan, and although he declined the invitation to a seat in the Assembly, he was highly esteemed by the members for his learning, orthodoxy, and piety. His friend, Dr. Hoyle, Professor of Divinity at Dublin, belonged to the committee which framed the Confession. [SeeNote #1465] The following tables will illustrate the relation of the Westminster Confession to the preceding standards of the English and Irish Church.

CONTENTS.

Neal says: ’Though all the divines were in the anti-Arminian scheme, yet some had a greater latitude than others. I find in my MS. the dissent of several members against some expressions relating to reprobation, to the imputation of the active as well as passive obedience of Christ, and to several passages in the chapter on liberty of conscience and Church discipline; but the Confession, as far as related to articles of faith, passed the Assembly and Parliament by a very great majority.’ [SeeNote #1466] Neal does not specify the differences to which he alludes. Since the publication of the Minutes we are enabled to ascertain them, at least to some extent, from the meagre and broken reports of debates on election and reprobation, on the fall of Adam, on the Covenants, on providence, free-will, creation, justification, sanctification, the sacraments, and other topics. In most cases the fact is simply mentioned that there was a debate; in others brief extracts of speeches are given which reveal minor differences of views, though not of parties, or even of schools. The debates on Church government were much more serious and heated. The harmony of so many scholars from all parts of England and Scotland, on a whole scheme of divinity, is truly surprising, and accounts for their sanguine hopes of securing a doctrinal uniformity in the three kingdoms. The Confession consists of thirty-three chapters, which cover, in natural order, all the leading articles of the Christian faith from the creation to the final judgment. It exhibits the consensus of the Reformed Churches on the Continent and in England and Scotland, which was one of the objects of Parliament intrusted to the Assembly.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

Following the precedent of most of the Continental Reformed Confessions and the Irish Articles, the Westminster formulary properly begins with the Bible, on which all our theology must be based, and sets forth its divine inspiration, authority, and sufficiency as an infallible rule of faith and practice, in opposition both to Romanism, which elevates ecclesiastical tradition to the dignity of a joint rule of faith, and to Rationalism, which teaches the sufficiency of natural reason. It excludes the Jewish Apocrypha entirely from the Canon, while in the English and Irish Articles they are at least enumerated, though distinguished from the canonical books. [SeeNote #1467] The Confession gives to reason, or the light of nature, its proper place, distinguishes between the original Scripture and the translations, maintains the true exegetical principle of the self-interpretation of Scripture in the light of the Spirit that inspired it, and carefully avoids committing itself to any mechanical or magical or any other particular theory concerning the mode and degrees of inspiration, or obstructing the investigation of critical questions concerning the text and the authorship (as distinct from the canonicity) of the several books. [SeeNote #1468] It rests the authority of the Bible on its own intrinsic excellence and the internal testimony of the Spirit rather than the external testimony of the Church, however valuable this is as a continuous witness. [SeeNote #1469] No other Protestant symbol has such a clear, judicious, concise, and exhaustive statement of this fundamental article of Protestantism. It has been pronounced equal in ability to the Tridentine decree on justification. [SeeNote #1470] It may more aptly be compared to the Tridentine decree on Scripture and tradition (Sess. IV.) and the recent Vatican decree on the dogmatic constitution of the Catholic faith (Sess. III.), as far as this relates to reason and revelation, and may be regarded as the best Protestant counterpart of the Roman Catholic doctrine of the rule of faith. The Confession plants itself exclusively on the Bible platform, without in the least depreciating the invaluable aid of human learning-patristic, scholastic, and modern -in its own proper place, as a means to an end and an aid in ascertaining the true sense of the mind of the Holy Spirit, who through his own inspired Word must alternately decide all questions of the Christian faith and duty. It is clear that Protestantism must sink or swim with this principle. Criticism, philosophy, and science may sweep away human traditions, confessions, creeds, and other outworks, but they can never destroy the fortress of God’s Word, which liveth and abideth forever.

THEOLOGY AND CHRISTOLOGY.

Ch. II., ’Of the Trinity,’ and Ch. XVIII., ’Of Christ the Mediator,’ contain one of the best statements of the Nicene doctrine of the Trinity and of the Chalcedonian Christology, as held by all orthodox Churches. On these articles the evangelical Protestant Confessions are entirely agreed.

PREDESTINATION.

Ch. III., ’Of God’s Eternal Decree,’ [SeeNote #1471] Ch. V., ’Of Providence,’ Ch. IX., ’Of Free Will,’ and Ch. XVIII., ’Of the Perseverance of the Saints,’ are closely connected. They present a logical chain of ideas which make up what is technically called ’the Calvinistic system,’ as developed first by Calvin himself against Romanism, then in Holland and England against Arminianism. This system had at that time a powerful hold upon the serious religious minds in England and Scotland, including many leading Episcopal divines (not of the Laudian type) who otherwise had no sympathy with Puritanism, and ridiculed it with bitter sarcasm, like Dr. South. Even the authorized English version of the Bible (1611) has been charged by Arminians with a Calvinistic bias, while Calvinists have never complained of any defect in this respect. [SeeNote #1472] The only question in the Assembly was as to the logical extent to which they should carry the doctrine of predestination in a confessional statement. The more consistent and rigorous scheme of supralapsarianism had its advocates in Westminster as well as in Dort, and was favored by Dr. Twisse, the Prolocutor, who followed Beza and Gomarus to the giddy abyss of including the fall itself in the absolute eternal decree as a necessary means for the manifestation of God’s justice; but the infralapsarian (or sublapsarian) scheme of Augustine decidedly triumphed. Supralapsarianism has always remained only a private speculation. The Westminster Confession goes, indeed, beyond the two Helvetic Confessions, the Heidelberg Catechism, the Scotch Confession, and the Thirty-nine Articles; but it goes not a whit further than the Canons of Dort (which had the approval of the delegates of King James), the Lambeth Articles, and the Irish Articles. [SeeNote #1473] It teaches really no more on predestination than the great Catholic Augustine had taught in the fourth century, as well as two archbishops of Canterbury-Anselm in the eleventh, and Bradwardine in the fourteenth century. [SeeNote #1474] It gives, however, a clearer logical shape and greater prominence to the doctrine in the system by placing it among the first articles. It puts the fall with its sinful consequences only under a permissive (as distinct from a causal or effective ) decree, and emphatically exempts God from all authorship of sin. [SeeNote #1475] It does not teach the horrible and blasphemous doctrine (so often unjustly and unscrupulously charged upon Calvinism) that God from eternity foreordained men for sin and damnation; but it does teach that out of the fallen mass of corruption God elected a definite number of men to salvation and ’passed by’ the rest, leaving them to the just punishment of their sins. This is severe and harsh enough, but very different from a decree of eternal reprobation, which term nowhere occurs in the Confession. The difference is made more clear from the debates in the ’Minutes.’ Several prominent members, as Calamy, Arrowsmith, Vines, Seaman, who took part in the preparation of the doctrinal standards, sympathized with the hypothetical universalism of the Saumur school (Cameron and Amyrauld) and with the moderate position of Davenant and the English delegates to the Synod of Dort. They expressed this sympathy on the floor of the Assembly, as well as on other occasions. They believed in a special effective election and final perseverance of the elect (as a necessary means to a certain end), but they held at the same time that God sincerely intends to save all men; that Christ intended to die, and actually died, for all men; and that the difference is not in the intention and offer on the part of God, but in the acceptance and appropriation on the part of men. [SeeNote #1476]

Another important and modifying feature is that the Confession, far from teaching fatalism or necessitarianism, expressly recognizes the freedom of will, and embraces in the divine decrees ’the liberty or contingency of second causes’ (Ch. III., 1). [SeeNote #1477] Herein it agrees with Ussher, Bullinger, and Calvin himself, and favorably differs from the Lutheran Formula of Concord, which (following the strong expressions of Luther and Flacius) unphilosophically represents the human will before conversion to be as passive as a dead log or stone. The Confession makes no attempt to solve the apparent contradiction between divine sovereignty and human freedom, but it at least recognizes both sides of the problem, and gives a basis for the assertion that God’s absolute decrees have no causal effect upon the sinful actions of men, for which they alone are responsible. With the Calvinistic particularism the limitation of redemption [SeeNote #1478] is closely connected. The difference is chiefly one of logical consistency. It refers to the efficiency of redemption or its actual application. All were agreed as to its absolute sufficiency or its infinite intrinsic value. All could subscribe the formula that Christ died sufficienter pro omnibus, efficaciter pro electis. Dr. Reynolds, who seems to have defended the more rigorous view, said in the debate: ’The Synod intended no more than to declare the sufficiency of the death of Christ; it is pretium in se, of sufficient value to all-nay, ten thousand worlds.’ [SeeNote #1479]

Nevertheless, behind the logical question is the far more important theological and practical question concerning the extent of the divine intention or purpose, viz., whether this is to be measured by God’s love and the intrinsic value of Christ’s merits, or by the actual result. On this question there was a difference of opinion among the divines, as the ’Minutes’ show, and this difference seems to have been left open by the framers of the Confession. On the one hand, the closing sentences of Ch. III. 6 (’neither are any other redeemed by Christ, effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved, but the elect only’), and Ch. VIII. 8 (’To all those for whom Christ hath purchased redemption, he doth certainly and effectually apply and communicate the same’), favor a limited redemption, unless the word redeemed be understood in a narrower sense, so as to be equivalent to saved, and to imply the subjective application or actual execution. [SeeNote #1480] On the other hand, Ch. VII. 3 teaches that under the covenant of grace the Lord ’freely offereth unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith in him, that they may be saved; and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto life his Holy Spirit, to make them willing and able to believe.’ This looks like a compromise between conditional universalism taught in the first clause, and particular election taught in the second. This is in substance the theory of the school of Saumur, which was first broached by a Scotch divine, Cameron (d.1625), and more fully developed by his pupil Amyrault, between A.D. 1630 and 1650, and which was afterwards condemned in the Helvetic Consensus Formula (1675). [SeeNote #1481]

ANTHROPOLOGY.

Chapters VI. to IX. present the usual doctrines of the Evangelical Reformed (Augustinian) anthropology, with the new feature of the Covenants. The doctrine of covenants belongs to a different scheme of theology from that of the divine decrees. It is biblical and historical rather than scholastic and predestinarian. It views man from the start as a free responsible agent, not as a machine for the execution of absolute divine decrees.

Ch. VII. distinguishes two covenants of God with man, the covenant of works made with Adam and his posterity on condition of perfect and personal obedience, and a covenant of grace made in Christ with believers, offering free salvation on condition of faith in him. The covenant of grace again is administered under two dispensations, the law and the gospel. In the Old Testament it was administered by promises, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances which forshadowed the future Saviour. Under the New Testament the covenant of grace is dispensed through the preaching of the Word and the administration of the Sacraments. There are therefore not two covenants of grace differing in substance, but one and the same under various dispensations. The exegetical arguments for the covenant of works are derived chiefly from Galatians 3:10; Galatians 3:12; Galatians 3:21; Romans 3:20; Romans 10:5; but these passages refer to the covenant of the law of Moses, not to a covenant in the primitive state, and lead rather to a distinction between the covenant of the law (which, however, was also a covenant of promise) and the covenant of the gospel (the fulfillment of the law and promise). [SeeNote #1482] The doctrine of covenants is usually traced to Dutch origin; but it was inaugurated after the middle of the sixteenth century by Caspar Olevianus (d. 1587), one of the authors of the Heidelberg Catechism, in a work on ’the Nature of God’s Covenant of Mercy with the Elect,’ on the basis of Jeremiah 38:31-34; Hebrews 8:8-12. [SeeNote #1483] Dr. Mitchell says that the Confession teaches no more on this subject than had been taught before by Rollock in Scotland and Cartwright in England. It is not probable, though not impossible, that the more fully developed theory of the covenants by John Coccejus was already known in England at the time when the Confession was framed. Coccejus likewise distinguishes the fœdus operum or naturæ in the state of innocence, and a fœdus gratiæ, after the fall, but he views the latter under three stages, the patriarchal or Abrahamic (œconomia ante legem ), the Mosaic (œconomia sub lege and the Christian (œconomia post legem ). [SeeNote #1484]

SOTERIOLOGY.

Chapters X. to XVIII. contain the best confessional statement of the evangelical doctrines of justification, adoption, sanctification, saving faith, good works, and assurance of salvation. The statement of justification by faith is as guarded and discriminating on the Protestant side of the question as the Tridentine statement of justification by faith and works is on the Roman Catholic side.

ECCLESIOLOGY.

Chapters XXV. and XXVI. In the doctrine of the Church the Protestant distinction between the invisible and visible Church is first clearly formulated, and the purest Churches under heaven are admitted to be ’subject to mixture and error.’ Christ is declared to be the only head of the Church-a most important principle, for which the Church of Scotland has contended faithfully against the encroachments of the civil power through years of trial and persecution. On the subject of the independence and self-government of the Church in her own proper sphere, the Presbyterian Church of Scotland (as also the Dissenting Churches in England, and all American Churches) are immeasurably in advance of all the Protestant Churches on the Continent, and even of the Church of England, which is still dependent on the crown and the will of a Parliament composed of professors of all religions and no religion. But while the Confession claims full freedom for the Church in the management of her own affairs, it claims no authority or superiority over the State like the hierarchical principle. It declares the Pope of Rome, who pretends to be the supreme head of the Church on earth, to be ’that Antichrist, that man of sin and son of perdition that exalteth himself in the Church against Christ and all that is called God’ (2 Thessalonians 2:3-4; 2 Thessalonians 2:8-9). [SeeNote #1485] The chapter on the Communion of Saints urges the duty of cherishing and promoting union and harmony with all Christians of whatever part of the visible Church. [SeeNote #1486] THE SACRAMENTS. The doctrine of the Sacraments in general, and Baptism, and the Lord’s Supper in particular, in Chs. XXVII.-XXIX., is the Calvinistic theory which we have already discussed elsewhere. [SeeNote #1487] It is the same which is taught in all the Reformed Confessions-Continental, Anglican, and Scotch. This is admitted by candid scholars. ’On the doctrine of the sacraments,’ says Marsden, an English Episcopalian, ’we do not perceive a shade of difference from the teaching of the Church of England.’ [SeeNote #1488] And Dr. Mitchell, a Scotch Presbyterian, says: ’The teaching of the Confession on the Lord’s Supper is the teaching of Cranmer, Latimer, and Ridley, of Hooker, Ussher, and many others, . . . as well as of Knox, who from his long residence in England, and with English exiles on the Continent, had thoroughly caught up their warm and catholic utterances. This teaching is as far removed from the bare remembrance theory attributed to the early Swiss Reformers as from the consubstantiation of Luther and the local or supra-local presence contended for by Roman Catholics and Anglo-Catholics. It is so spiritual, yet so really satisfying, that even some High-Churchmen have owned that it would be difficult to find a better directory in the study of questions relating to this sacrament than is supplied in the Confession of Faith.’ [SeeNote #1489]