GRACE AND TRUTH
An Erskine Theological Seminary Publication
ASSEMBLY
CONTENTS
Dr. Seth J. Nelson - Remember the Old Days
Dr. John Paul Marr - The “Light of Nature” at Westminster
Dr. Mark E. Ross - The “Grand Debate” at Westminster
Chaplain (CPT) Caleb W. Wright - “Our Hearty Agreement with Them” Baptist Identity and Westminster Theology in the Second London Confession
Dr. Matthew S. Miller - From English to Urdu: Notable Moments in the Translation History of the Westminster Standards
Dr. David P. Smith - Warfield and Westminster
Dr. R. J. Gore Jr. - Reflections on Worship after Westminster
News at Erskine
Leadership and Faculty News Alumni In Action
CONTRIBUTORS:
Dr. Seth J. Nelson
Dr. John Paul Marr
Dr. Mark E. Ross
Chaplain (CPT) Caleb W. Wright
Dr. Matthew S. Miller
Dr. David P. Smith
Dr. R. J. Gore Jr.
4 7 12 31 36 21 27 16
EDITORIAL TEAM:
Mr. Heath Milford, Editor
Dr. Mark Ross, Assistant Editor
Mrs. Langley Shealy, Graphic and Design
Photography: Mrs. Langley Shealy
FROM THE DEAN
Remember the Old Days
Why study history? We study history to retrieve valuable insights from those who have gone before us and gain further perspective on our present situations. We study history to evaluate our unchecked modern assumptions and cultivate humility to counteract what C. S. Lewis has called “chronological snobbery.” We study history to learn, to reflect, and, hopefully, to change.
For many Presbyterian and Reformed Christians today, whether they realize it or not, the work of the seventeenth-century Westminster Assembly has profoundly shaped their life of faith. Its remarkable influence extends to other Protestant denominations as well, and rightly so. The Westminster Confession of Faith has been praised as having “[brought] to a climax in a grand and monumental way one of the great theological periods in the history of the Christian church.” 1 Down through the ages, across seas and continents, and among various societies, the words of Westminster continue to speak – and we would do well to listen and learn.
This edition of Grace & Truth features the “Ideas and Influence” of the Westminster Assembly and its impact on the Church over the centuries since its documents were first published. Dr. John Paul Marr draws our attention to the philosophical genealogy which informed the phrase “the light of nature” in the Westminster Confession of Faith and how its authors carefully crafted their understanding of revelation. Dr. Mark Ross focuses on Church government debates among the Westminster divines and how we should view these perspectives in light of both the Bible and the political situation at that time. Chaplain (CPT) Caleb Wright demonstrates the influence of the Westminster Confession of Faith on other seventeenth-century confessions, noting in particular the indebtedness of Baptists and Congregationalists.
Dr. Matthew Miller traces the history of translating the Westminster Assembly documents, highlighting both past European efforts and present-day work in former Soviet bloc countries. Dr. David Smith describes the significance of the Westminster Confession and Catechisms on the theology of B. B. Warfield. And Dr. R. J. Gore Jr. reflects on worship principles inherited from the Westminster Assembly and how our current liturgical disagreements might be unified “according to Scripture.”
I hope you enjoy and are edified by this edition of Grace & Truth as we seek to “Remember the days of old, [and] consider the years of all generations . . . “(Deut. 32:7).
Rev. Seth J. Nelson, PhD Dean of Erskine Seminary and Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology and Educational Leadership
1 John H. Leith, Assembly at Westminster: Reformed Theology in the Making (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2008), 11
Our Vision and Mission
Erskine College Institutional Mission:
VISION – Erskine College exists to equip students for lives of service and leadership, building Christ’s Church and influencing society for God’s glory.
MISSION – The mission of Erskine College is to glorify God as a Christian academic community where students integrate knowledge and faith, equipped to flourish as whole persons prepared for lives of service, leadership, and influence through the pursuit of undergraduate liberal arts, graduate, and seminary education.
Erskine Theological Seminary Mission
Erskine Theological Seminary prepares men and women to fulfill the Great Commission of Jesus Christ through theological higher education that is ecclesial, missional, and confessional.
• Burden (Why we exist): Erskine Theological Seminary, an agency of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, exists because Jesus Christ calls laborers for his harvest who are skilled in the handling of the Word of God.
• Vision (How we lift the burden): Erskine Theological Seminary is a Biblical, Reformed, and Evangelical Seminary community of learning sustained in prayer, supported by a growing constituency, united in faith, and fueled by the power of the Holy Spirit for gospel transformation in every area of life.
• Values (Non-negotiable essentials that guide us): Erskine Theological Seminary is grounded in the person and work of the only Savior of humanity, our Lord Jesus Christ, as he is presented in the inerrant and infallible Holy Scriptures; the summary of which is found in the Westminster Standards; and taught with academic excellence by qualified pastor-scholars in a nurturing and gracious community of learning.
• Philosophy of Ministry (How we do our work): Erskine Theological Seminary promotes the Vision and Mission through biblical and confessional faithfulness, multiple modalities, and academic excellence, set in a loving, pastoral community of service.
ASSEMBLY AT WESTMINSTER Ideas and Influence
The “Light of Nature” at Westminster
John Paul Marr, Adjunct Professor of Historical Theology
In A Short History of the Westminster Assembly William Beveridge commented, “It is scarcely necessary to say of the Westminster Assembly that it was the child of its age.”1 Political, social, and economic tides and trajectories of the seventeenth century influenced the gathering called by the English Parliament to develop confessional, liturgical, ecclesiastical, and catechetical uniformity in England, Ireland, and Scotland. At that time war was erupting, and various allegiances were identifying lines of religious division. During this period the Assembly composed the Directory of Public Worship (1645), the Form of Presbyterial Church Government (1645), the Confession (1646), and two catechisms (Larger and Shorter; 1647). While the theological parents of these documents have been often examined, its philosophical lineage is usually relegated to the far corners of its genealogy, even viewed by some as a handmaiden or mere mistress.2 However, the philosophically entrenched concept, “the light of nature,” became, in the hands of these Westminster divines, a helpful means for expressing the value of natural reason from a biblical perspective.
According to Beveridge, the membership of the Westminster Assembly included some of the “most gifted men in England,” “famous,” and “had and still have a European reputation.”3 As “consummate masters of philosophy,” notes E.W. Smith, “they were familiar with the great schools of human thought from Plato to Aristotle down to Bacon and Descartes.”4 Smith contends, though, that “in framing these standards their one and only aim was to express the mind of Scripture. In their whole system of doctrine no tinge of human philosophy is apparent.”5 John R. Richardson shares a similar opinion, writing, “Present in this body of men were some of the most brilliant of contemporary philosophers, but they permitted not one iota of human philosophy to influence their creedal statements.”6 Yet the phrase “the light of nature,” a term that grounded René Descartes’ argument in Meditations on First Philosophy, appears nine times in the Westminster documents.
The Westminster divines inherited a philosophical tapestry that up to the twelfth century had developed according to Augustinian-Anselmian patterns. Then, during the thirteenth century, a rediscovery of Aristotle’s writings created “an overwhelming experience” and the great thinkers of England and the Continent began “confining themselves to interpreting Aristotle’s theories,” adapting and shaping them, even applying his philosophical methodology in order to present Christianity as a rational theology.7 Such Christian-Aristotelian thought appeared in the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274).8
Ancient philosophers considered natural theology (as an outworking of natural reason) to be “philosophical truths about God as distinguished from state cults and religious myths.”9 In the Summa Theologica Aquinas explored how natural theology allowed a person to acquire genuine, though limited, knowledge of God in His essence and in how He related to His creation without special revelation.10 Aquinas argued that knowledge comes through two means: special revelation and human reason (as the means of reading general revelation). Every person could, on some basic level, recognize certain truths, such as the existence of God, without the aid of special revelation. He wrote, “To know that God exists in a general and confused way is implanted in us by nature.” 11 He then offered five proofs of God’s existence, the quinque viae, where each argument starts with an effect that can be reasoned back to its Divine cause.
The “Light of Nature” at Westminster (cont.)
Aquinas did not intend such reasoning to replace faith. He sought to recognize the common truths of nature as understood by reason. He wrote, “The existence of God and other like truths about God, which can be known by natural reason, are not articles of faith, but are preambles to the articles; for faith presupposes natural knowledge.” 12 Aquinas thought that certain truths about the world could be known as both theoretical and practical truths.13 The starting points of those practical truths Aquinas called Natural Law, when ethics are in view, and “the light of nature,” when speaking of the self-evident existence of general truths.14 He intended to establish a “continuum between the natural theology, that which is known by the light of natural reason, and revealed theology, that which is known by the light of faith.” 15 Yet natural theology, as it evolved, severed any such cohesion and became “truths about God [that] can be learned from created things (Nature, man, world) by reason alone.”16
Some of the Westminster divines did use causality, like Aquinas, to argue philosophically for the existence of God. Edward Reynolds (1599-1676), for example, wrote, “There is a natural theology, with the Word, gathered out of the works of God, out of the resolution of causes and effects into their first originals, and out of the law of nature written in the heart.” 17 Aristotle’s terminology was prevalent in their writings because they all had the “general Aristotelian background of all university-trained men.” 18 Many in the Assembly were influenced by the teachings of Petrus Ramus (1515-1572) and adhered to his understanding of how a logical theology could be “communicated to every man.” 19 Ramus opposed Scholasticism yet saw philosophy as an apologetic tool to preach the gospel more effectively.20
According to Charles Pierce, it was René Descartes (1596-1650) who truly “led philosophy out of the wilderness of Scholasticism.” 21 Likewise, John Cottingham saw Descartes as “the chief architect of the seventeenth-century intellectual revolution that destabilized the traditional doctrines of medieval and Renaissance scholasticism” laying down the philosophical foundations of the modern scientific age.22 Descartes’ ultimate concern was to find an universal method that could be applied to all disciplines by using the principles of evidence and certainty in mathematics. In his Meditations on First Philosophy, he searched for what constituted reliable knowledge. By first doubting his previous held beliefs, Descartes hoped to discover whether there are any certain truths that he could not possibly doubt.23 Descartes had to question his own sense experience since he realized that the senses can be deceived. He stripped away all uncertainties to encounter a basic insight upon which truth can be determined with absolute certainty. He wrote,
When I say that I am so instructed by nature, I merely mean a certain spontaneous inclination which impels me to believe in this connection . . . for I cannot doubt that which the natural light causes me to believe to be true, as, for example, it has shown me that I am from the fact that I doubt.24
The cogito ergo sum, “I think, therefore, I am,” acts as this one universal truth.
Yet the cogito only validates the self. George Dicker asked whether the cogito is “really a proof of one’s own existence, because its premise, ‘I am thinking,’ already uses the ‘I’ whose existence is supposedly proved in the conclusion, ‘I exist.’” 25 This critique reveals that Descartes’ starting point is really with the belief that there are certain simple and self-evident truths we can know. Descartes used the term “light of nature” to convey how humans discover these truths. He concluded, “I see nothing in all that I have said which by the light of nature is not manifest to anyone who desires to think attentively on the subject.” 26
The “Light of Nature” at Westminster (cont.)
The limitations of knowing, at least beyond just one’s self, lead Descartes to proving God’s existence. To Descartes, reasoning can demonstrate that a perfect being exists. He wrote, “Now it is manifest by the natural light that there must be at least as much reality in the efficient and total cause as in its effect.” 27 Echoing Anselm (1033-1109), Descartes reasoned that the existence of God as the perfect Being is logically true because a being that does not exist would not be perfect.
With the existence of God so established, humans may then seek what is true and certain, recognizing that one can only accept what is clearly perceived as given by God. He explained, “Thus the light of nature causes me to know clearly that the ideas in me are like [pictures or] images which can, in truth, easily fall short of the perfection of the objects from which they were derived.” 28 The perfect Being of God therefore takes the central role in Descartes’ system as the “guarantor of the reliability of human cognition.” 29 The existence of God is then the basis for all further knowledge.
Although not readily received at first, many theologians and scientists in the seventeenth century would eventually build upon Descartes’ writings so that it even usurped the teachings of Aristotle in schools.30 According to G.D. Henderson, Robert Baillie (1602-1662), a Scots Commissioner of the Westminster Assembly, “condemned [Descartes] very summarily” in part because Descartes was understood through the writings of Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), who was regarded as an atheist.31 Prior to the Westminster Assembly, many Puritans had criticized the Church for sanctioning this new definition of reason apart from revelation and its dramatic ascent to a place of authority. At the time, “reason” became defined less by faith, and more as its own independent source. However, the Westminster divines still saw reason working with faith in Christ.32
Philosophically the Westminster Assembly held to the “age of faith” rather than submitting to the rapidly encroaching “age of reason.”33 So the phrase “the light of nature,” though common during the time of the Westminster Assembly, took on a different nuance in its confessional use.34 As stated, Aquinas and Descartes used the phrase as part of their self-evidential arguments: Aquinas through the senses and Descartes through his own ability of self-cognition. In Jus Divinum Regiminis Ecclesiastici, or, the Divine Right of Church Government by the London Provincial Assembly of 1646, the authors did explain the “light of nature” as “natural reason.”35 Prior to the Fall in Genesis 3, humanity, created in the Image of God exhibited this perfect reason; however, following the Fall, there still remained, they argued, “so much natural light in the minds even of the heathens, as to render them capable of instruction by the creature in the invisible things of God; yea, and that they actually in some measure did know God, and because they walked not up to this knowledge, were plagued (Rom. 1:18-24).” 36
The phrase “light of nature” appears immediately in the first sentence of the first chapter of the Confession, which states,
Although the light of nature, and the works of creation and providence, do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom, and power of God, as to leave men inexcusable; yet they are not sufficient to give that knowledge of God, and of His will, which is necessary unto salvation.37
Robert Shaw’s 1846 exposition of the Confession has observed an interweaving of both Thomist and Cartesian understanding since he acknowledged “the light of nature” as meaning “the senses” (Aquinas) and “the reasoning powers” (Descartes), explaining,
The “Light of Nature” at Westminster (cont.)
When we affirm that the being of God may be discovered by the light of nature, we mean that the senses and the reasoning powers, which belong to the nature of man, are able to give him so much light as to manifest that there is a God. By our senses we are acquainted with his works, and by his works our reason may be led to trace out that more excellent Being who made them.38
A.A. Hodge (1823-1886) had noted three dangers that could occur if one misinterprets “the light of nature” according to either Aquinas or Descartes: one, an extreme rationalism which denies all knowledge apart from the senses (empiricism); two, that nothing of God can be known from “the light of nature” (a rejection of general revelation); and lastly, that “the light of nature” is sufficient to lead one into the necessary knowledge of salvation (promoted by deists and rationalistic theists).39 The Westminster divines steered clear of these three dangers by following in the footsteps of the Reformers who believed that all people had some knowledge of God’s existence.
John Calvin (1509-1564) wrote, “There is within the human mind, and indeed by natural instinct, an awareness of divinity.”40 The light of nature exposes that awareness but is insufficient to give fallen humanity that necessary knowledge of God’s will for salvation. Such light prepares a way for the receiving of the gospel of His grace. It is different from the works of creation and providence. Rather it is something inherent in humanity, a part of being made in the Image of God, a “reasonable soul, which… is a rare and curious book, on which is written by the immediate finger of God, that natural theology, that we had in our first creation.”41
Even so, the Westminster Confession’s understanding of “the light of nature” resisted the circular argument of Descartes’ self-validating cogito. Shaw contends that the divines understood that the existence of God “is not less indubitable than our own existence. Every man knows, with absolute certainty, that he himself exists.”42 The Scriptures “take the being of God for granted, and instead of first proving that there is a God, they begin by telling us what He did.”43
The framework of the Confession was based in part on the Irish Articles of 1615, which did not address general revelation. Yet the Westminster Confession moves from recognizing the value of the “light of nature” towards the ultimate authoritative revelation of Scripture. The first word of the Confession is a concessive conjunction: “although.” This is a critical choice, delineating the valuable (though limited) God-given “light of nature” in humanity from the more profound God-given special revelation of Scripture. The God revealed through natural theology cannot access the theological heights of the God of Scripture – the God of Redemption.
Paul explains in Romans 1 and 2 that the natural knowledge of God is distorted due to the Fall, but what could be understood is God’s goodness, wisdom, and power which is enough to leave all humanity without excuse (Psalm 19:1-6). The answer to the Larger Catechism Question Two is: “The very light of nature in man, and the works of God, declare plainly that there is a God; but His word and Spirit only do sufficiently and effectually reveal Him unto men for their salvation.” The Holy, Just, Merciful, and Righteous God who is Love cannot be fully known just through the “light of nature.” Yet the philosophical “light of nature,” though marred in fallen humanity, may be brought into His marvelous light and receive, by God’s grace, the theological reality: that the light of the world was revealed, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and in His light, we do see the True Light, the person of Jesus Christ.
John Paul Marr (PhD, University of Aberdeen) is Adjunct Professor of Historical Theology at Erskine Seminary and pastor of Troy Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Troy, SC. He received a MATS, ’11; MDiv, ’11; and ThM, ’15 from Erskine Seminary.
The “Light of Nature” at Westminster (cont.)
1 William Beveridge, A Short History of The Westminster Assembly (Edinburgh, Scotland: T. & T. Clark, 1904), 3.
2 Knut Tranǿy, “Thomas Aquinas,” A Critical History of Western Philosophy, edited by D.J. O’Connor (London, England: Collier-Macmillan Limited, 1964), 101. He writes, “One implication of Averroism would be to make philosophy, not the handmaid, but rather the mistress of theology, supported by the new-found authority of Aristotle.”
3 Beveridge, 23.
4 Quoted in Jack Bartlett Rogers, Scripture in the Westminster Confession: A Problem of Historical Interpretation for American Presbyterianism (Amsterdam, Netherlands: J.H. Kok N.V. Kampen, 1966), 220.
5 Rogers, 220.
6 John R. Richardson, “Introduction,” in Gordon H. Clark, What do Presbyterians Believe?: The Westminster Confession: Yesterday and Today, xi-xii; as quoted in Rogers, 221.
7 Anders Wedberg, A History of Philosophy, Volume I: Antiquity and the Middle Ages, translated by Bergljot Wedberg (Oxford, England: Claredon Press, 1982), 166-167.
8 In England, Roger Bacon (ca. 1214-1294), Duns Scotus (ca. 1265-1308), and his pupil William of Ockham (d.ca. 1349), challenged Aquinas’s understanding of Aristotle.
9 J. Van Engen, “Natural Theology,” in Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, Second Edition, edited by Walter A. Elwell (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2001), 815.
10 Diogenes Allen and Eric O. Springsted, Philosophy for Understanding Theology, Second Edition (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2007), 106107.
11 Thomas Aquinas, excerpts of the Summa Theologica, Part I, Question II, in Primary Readings in Philosophy for Understanding Theology, edited by Diogenes Allen and Eric O. Springsted (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1992), 93.
12 Aquinas, 95.
13 Ralph McInerny, “Aquinas,” in A Companion to the Philosophers, edited by Robert L. Arrington (Boston, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1999), 125.
14 McInerny, 125.
15 Engen, 815.
16 Engen, 815.
17 Reynolds, “Psalm 110,” as quoted in Rogers, 266.
18 Rogers, 237.
19 Rogers, 236.
20 Rogers, 236.
21 Charles Hartshorne, Insights and Oversights of Great Thinkers: An Evaluation of Western Philosophy (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1983), 111. The author observes the biblical inaccuracy of the statement.
22 John Cottingham, “Descartes, René,” in The Oxford Companion to Philosophy, edited by Ted Honderich (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1995), 188.
23 George Dicker, “Descartes,” in A Companion to the Philosophers, 211. Ironically, it is an Aristotelian-Scholastic understanding of properties requiring a substance to “adhere in” and be doubted that grounds his argument.
24 René Descartes, excerpts from Meditations of First Philosophy in Primary Readings in Philosophy for Understanding Theology, 128.
25 Dicker, 211.
26 Descartes, 135.
27 Descartes, 130.
28 Descartes, 131.
29 Cottingham, 190.
30 Dicker, 209.
31 G. D. Henderson, 133; as quoted by Rogers, 113. Henderson notes that Baillie did have “the grace in the same breath to ask for more of [Descartes’] works.” Also, Hobbes was associated with the exiled Charles II and considered a Royalist.
32 Rogers, 115.
33 Rogers suggest that Francis Bacon (1561-1626), not Descartes, was the intellectual influence in England (113).
34 Rogers, 265.
35 Jus Divinum Regiminis Ecclesiastici, or The Divine Right of Church Government, by sundry Ministers of London (c. 1646), 8-11; Internet, www. purelypresbyterian.com; accessed 25 April 2023.
36 Jus Divinum Regiminis Ecclesiastici, or The Divine Right of Church Government, by sundry Ministers of London (c. 1646), 9.
37 Westminster Confession of Faith, I.I, in Creeds of the Churches, Third Edition, edited by John H. Leith (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1982), 193.
38 Robert Shaw, An Exposition of the Westminster Confession of Faith (Ross-shire, Great Britain: Christian Focus Publications, 1998), 36.
39 A. A. Hodge, A Commentary on the Confession of Faith (Philadelphia, PA: Presbyterian Board of Publications and Sabbath-School Work, 1923), 44-50.
40 John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Volume I, edited by John T. McNeill and translated and indexed by Ford Lewis Battles (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1960), I.III.1, 41.
41 Samuel Rutherford, as quoted by Rogers, 267.
42 Shaw, 36.
43 Shaw, 38.
The “Grand Debate” at Westminster
Mark E. Ross, Professor of Systematic Theology
Today the work of the Westminster Assembly is chiefly known by its doctrinal standards in the Confession of Faith together with the Larger and Shorter Catechisms. Yet in its time, the period of the English Civil War (or Wars) of the 1640s, there were in the minds of Parliament two issues of greater urgency facing the nation and the church. What they were can be seen from the ordinance that called the Westminster Assembly into being “for the settling of the government and liturgy of the Church of England.” 1
Modern minds could find it very puzzling that in a time of civil war between the King and Parliament, when the peace and well-being of the nation were so much threatened, Parliament should find it necessary and important to assemble ministers and theologians from across the land to discuss how God should be worshipped and how the church should be governed. But these things were all intimately connected in the seventeenth century. This article will focus on just one of these concerns, the government of the church.
In its rationale for calling such an assembly, the ordinance of Parliament declared:
Whereas, amongst the infinite blessings of Almighty God upon this nation, none is nor can be more dear unto us than the purity of our religion; and for that, as yet, many things remain in the liturgy and government of the Church, which do necessarily require a further and more perfect reformation than as yet hath been attained; and whereas it hath been declared and resolved by the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament, that the present Church-government by archbishops, their chancellors, commissars, deans, deans and chapters, archdeacons, and other ecclesiastical officers depending upon the hierarchy, is evil, and justly offensive and burdensome to the kingdom, a great impediment to reformation and growth of religion, and very prejudicial to the state and government of the kingdom; and therefore they are resolved that the same shall be taken away, and that such a government shall be settled in the Church as may be most agreeable to God’s holy word, and most apt to procure and preserve the peace of the Church at home, and nearer agreement with the Church of Scotland, and other Reformed Churches abroad . . .2
Several things especially are to be noted from the ordinance. First, the hierarchical government of the Church of England is judged to be a great evil , being contrary to Scripture and bringing much harm to both the church and the nation. Second, it is the declared intention of Parliament to remove this hierarchy and replace it with a new form of government “as may be most agreeable to God’s holy word.” 3 Third, the form of government to be instituted must be nearer in agreement with the Church of Scotland and other Reformed churches abroad, as they are regarded to be more in line with what the Scriptures demand.
Let us focus first on the alleged evil of the church hierarchy. It is important to remember that this hierarchy reached its apex not in the Archbishop of Canterbury, but in the King of England who would appoint him. The king was the true head of the church and, the English monarchs judged this to be necessary for the king to be the true sovereign of the nation. Charles I, who ruled from 1625 through the time of the Westminster Assembly (d. 1649), believed as his father, James I, believed: “No Bishop, no King.”4
The “Grand Debate” at Westminster (cont.)
The concern, therefore, was not merely that the church of England was ruled by a clerical hierarchy that had no foundation in the Holy Scriptures, and that the people of the church had no role in choosing the officers that should be set over the church (a principle so dear to Presbyterianism), but that this hierarchy was supremely determined by a monarch who ruled not by spiritual giftedness and qualification, but by hereditary succession. The king alone appointed the Archbishop of Canterbury, and through the archbishop, all other church officials were determined. Painful experience had proven, to the minds of the Long Parliament, 5 that such a government in the church was truly evil and a hindrance to the reformation of the church. The structure must be removed, “root and branch,” as had been demanded in the Root and Branch Petition of 1640 signed by 15,000 Londoners and presented to Parliament.6
The Assembly would sit as a committee of Parliament, to advise it on matters concerning the reform of the church. But what form of government should be given to the new church? That proved to be a harder question than expected. There were, of course, a few among the Assembly who believed that the hierarchy of the church was fundamentally correct, though it had defects that needed to be removed. This party was very small in the Assembly for the King prohibited anyone from attending the Assembly. But only those favorable to the King obeyed the decree, so the result was that the great majority of the Assembly proved hostile to the hierarchy just as Parliament had been.
But there the agreement stopped. Many were favorable to a Presbyterian church government, such as could be found in the Church of Scotland and in other European Reformed churches. The number of those with this conviction somewhat increased as the Assembly continued. But there was also a determined opposition to this form of church government, from those labeled as Independents.7 They favored a congregational form of church government, in which each church is sufficient in itself to carry out all the ordinances of Christ. A decade after the framing of the Westminster Confession, the English Congregationalists published their own confession of faith, The Savoy Declaration, in which large portions of the Westminster Confession were taken over unchanged, while at the same time, they amended the Confession where they found it necessary, especially on the doctrine of the church. They provided an addendum to the Confession on “The Institution of Churches, and the Order Appointed in Them by Jesus Christ.” It contains thirty additional articles pertaining to the institution of the visible church. Notable among those articles are:
Those thus called (through the ministry of the Word by his Spirit) he commandeth to walk together in particular societies or churches, for their mutual edification, and the due performance of that public worship, which he requireth of them in this world.
These particular churches thus appointed by the authority of Christ, and entrusted with power from him for the ends before expressed, are each of them as unto those ends, the seat of that power which he is pleased to communicate to his saints or subjects in this world, so that as such they receive it immediately from himself. 4.
To each of these churches thus gathered, according to his mind declared in his Word, he hath given all that power and authority, which is any way needful for their carrying on that order in worship and discipline, which he hath instituted for them to observe, with commands and rules for the due and right exerting and executing of that power.
The “Grand Debate” at Westminster (cont.)
6.
Besides these particular churches, there is not instituted by Christ any church more extensive or catholic entrusted with power for the administration of his ordinances, or the execution of any authority in his name.
Notice that in these articles there is an affirmation of both the competency and sufficiency of each local congregation to carry out all the ordinances of Christ given to the church (#4). Notice too the explicit denial that, besides local church government, there is any other church government instituted by Christ in the world (#6). So much for presbyteries and General Synods, except in an advisory capacity.8 The Independents believed that the Presbyterian church government simply replaced one dangerous hierarchy with another—a hierarchy of church courts rather than offices. 9 John Milton’s famous line sums up this viewpoint rather succinctly: “New Presbyter is but Old Priest writ large.” 10
Within the Westminster Assembly, the cause of the Independents was championed by Thomas Goodwin, Philip Nye, Sidrach Simpson, Jeremiah Burroughs, and William Bridge, who authored An Apologeticall Narration as a manifesto of their views.11 This caused much offense to the Assembly, because it was not first presented to the Assembly for discussion and debate but sent directly to Parliament and circulated publicly in London and beyond. It thus sought to bypass the Assembly (where it had little chance of passing) and to secure both Parliament’s and the public’s approval through a direct appeal.
It was this clash between the Presbyterians and the Independents which constituted “the Grand Debate” in the Westminster Assembly.12 How did the Presbyterians defend their form of government over against the challenges of the Independents? They argued first from the example of the church in Jerusalem. Given its great size (Acts 2:41, 4:4), and the many apostles in Jerusalem who devoted themselves to teaching, they argued that the church in Jerusalem must have been divided into many congregations, for all the people could not have gathered together for meals and times of worship. Yet the church in Jerusalem is called a “church” (Acts 2:47, 5:11), and it acts jointly under the authority of the apostles in, for example, electing the seven deacons who are put in charge of the daily distribution (Acts 6:1-7).
More important, however, is the example of the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15). Once the church in Jerusalem had been scattered away from the city, a church was begun in Antioch when the Gentiles received the word of God (Acts 11:19-26). Soon a controversy arose over whether these Gentile believers should be circumcised according to the Law of Moses, thus subjecting them to all that Law (Acts 15:1, 5). Luke describes the ensuing controversy “as no small dissension and debate” (Acts 15:2). So, it was determined that Paul and Barnabas and some others should go up to the apostles and elders in Jerusalem to consider this question. This chapter makes repeated mention of the “apostles and elders” meeting together on this matter and finally reaching a consensus (Acts 15:2, 4, 6, 22, 23; see also 16:4).
What is so very striking about this passage is, first, that the church of Antioch did not settle this question on its own but takes up the matter in consultation with the church in Jerusalem. Second, the issue is not even settled by the apostles alone; it is considered and decided by the council of apostles and elders. This provides an example of how similar controversies should be handled in the future, especially when there are no longer any apostles on the earth. The Presbyterians viewed this example as demonstrating that in matters of greater importance, churches should be subject to one another in their doctrine and practice, as parts to the whole.13
The “Grand Debate” at Westminster (cont.)
So far as the decisions of the Westminster Assembly were concerned, it was the Presbyterians who won the day in framing The Form of Presbyterial Church Government which was presented to the Parliament and sent to Scotland for its approval. But the much sought-after uniformity in “doctrine, worship, discipline, and government” to which Parliament and the Westminster divines were pledged in the Solemn League and Covenant (1643) did not come to fruition. Scotland did receive and approve the Form of Government, but events in England—for example, the victory of Cromwell’s New Model Army, the execution of Charles I, the failure of the Commonwealth government under Cromwell’s son, Richard, etc.—combined to bring about the restoration of the monarchy and the Church of England with all its episcopal hierarchy in 1660. The whole work of the Westminster Assembly proved to be for naught in the land where it was convened. But with those Standards received and adopted in Scotland, they would live on and spread around the world. Though the purpose for which the Assembly had been called was never achieved, the Assembly’s work proved to be an overwhelming success in what it passed on to the world.
Mark E. Ross (PhD, University of Keele) is The First Presbyterian Church – John R. de Witt Chair of Theology at Erskine Seminary and Associate Dean for Erskine Columbia. He is the author of Let’s Study Matthew.
1 The ordinance was published on June 12, 1643. See the Westminster Confession of Faith (Free Presbyterian Publications, 1958), 13f. The title for this book is rather misleading, for the book contains not just the Confession of Faith, but all the documents approved by the Westminster Assembly, except the Psalter, together with several other related documents important to Presbyterianism in Scotland.
2 Westminster Confession of Faith, 13.
3 Ibid.
4 William Beveridge, A Short History of the Westminster Assembly. Revised and edited by J. Ligon Duncan III (Greenville, SC: Reformed Academic Press, 1993), 8.
5 So-called because it refused to be dissolved by King Charles I and thus remained in session a long time.
6 See John R. de Witt, Jus Divinum: The Westminster Assembly and the Divine Right of Church Government (Dallas: Confessional Presbyterian Press, 2010), 11-13.
7 They did not accept the title as accurately describing their position, for they saw themselves occupying a middle ground between the Independency advocated by Robert Browne and the Presbyterians. See Beveridge, A Short History, sec. 56, pp. 57f.
8 See articles 26 and 27 in the addendum to the Savoy Declaration, “The Institution of Churches, and the Order Appointed in Them by Jesus Christ.”
9 Presbyterians would seem to accept this criticism, since the language of higher and lower courts is commonly used in our churches today. But is worth considering whether we might better express our form of government as making smaller parts (individual churches) of the church subordinate to larger parts (presbyteries and synods), rather than as lower courts subordinate to higher ones, since the officers serving in these courts are all of the same rank.
10 From his poem, “On the New Forcers of Conscience under the Long Parliament.”
11 The portrait on the cover of this journal is by John Rogers Herbert and entitled “Assertion of Liberty of Conscience by the Independents in the Westminster Assembly of Divines, 1644.” It depicts Philip Nye (standing) in opposition to the Presbyterian call for uniformity in church government. See Rowland S. Ward, “Westminster Assembly Picture Review,” February 22, 2008, https://rowlandward.net/westminster-assembly-picture-review/. Accessed May 12, 2023.
12 Cf. Robert S. Paul, The Assembly of the Lord: Politics and Religion in the Westminster Assembly and the ‘Grand Debate’ (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1985). See also John R. de Witt, Jus Divinum. The principles of the Independents were submitted to the Parliament and then returned to the Assembly for answers. Agreement on the principles could not be secured, so the positions of both parties were printed together in 1648. In 1652 the whole was reprinted under the title “The Grand Debate concerning Presbytery and Independency by the Assembly of Divines.” See Beverdige, A Short History, sec. 67, pp. 69f.
13 Paul and Barnabas then returned to Antioch and delivered the decision of the council. On his second missionary journey, Paul took Silas and Timothy with him and they delivered to the churches founded on the first missionary journey the decision of the council. What had been decided in the council of churches became the rule for all the churches. This is the heart of Presbyterian church government.
“Our
Hearty Agreement with Them”
Baptist Identity and Westminster Theology in the Second London Confession
Chaplain (CPT) Caleb W. Wright, Erskine Seminary Alumnus
“Confessions, when made by a company or Professors of Christianity jointly meeting to that end, the most genuine and natural use of such Confessions is, That under the same form of words, they express the substance of the same common salvation or unity of their faith; whereby speaking the same things, they show themselves perfectly joined in the same mind, and in the same judgment, I Cor. i. 10. And accordingly such a transaction is to be looked upon but as a meet or fit medium or means whereby to express that their common faith and salvation, and no way to be made use of as an imposition upon any: Whatever is of force or constraint in matters of this nature, causeth them to degenerate from the name and nature of Confessions, and turns them from being Confessions of Faith, into Exaetions (sic) and Impositions of Faith.”1
Referenced above you will find an excerpt from of one the confessions that marked and characterized seventeenth-century England, a century that has been described as unsettled in matters of church and state.2 Coming into focus during this time of unrest was a group which was known as Separatists or Dissenters. Further categorization would divide them into the more descriptive subsets such as Puritans, Congregationalists, Baptists, and Presbyterians. And the entity from which these groups were separating or dissenting was the established state church, the Church of England.
However, the purpose of this article is not to elaborate broadly on the historical context of the time, but rather to focus on the formulation of the 1689 London Confession, also known as the Second London Confession (2LC), in relation to the Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF). More specifically, we will demonstrate how this document demarcated the Particular Baptists from the General Baptists while simultaneously affirming the cohesions within the Separatist movement. Much has been written on the differences between these two confessions. For that, I refer the reader to James Anderson and Paul M. Smalley.3 This article will focus more on the commonalities.
Context and Mindset
Regarding this commonality, a central element that bears pointing out was the intent and mindset behind it. Yet, the backdrop of the socio-political landscape is also part of the picture that gives clarity to the relationship between these two confessions and the confessors behind them. So, the following is an abbreviated timeline of events taking place during the organization and formulation of the confessions in view. Separatist beginnings can be traced back to the Puritan movement at the turn of the seventeenth century. During the “Long Parliament” and brief era of the English Republic, there was a flurry of activity as Separatists were seeking to clarify and refine what they believed. In 1644 we have the London Confession (subsequently known as the First London Confession) which borrowed heavily from the Separatist Confession of 1596. In 1646, after years of work, the WCF was completed. Next, in 1658 the Savoy Declaration was affirmed. Then, in 1662, as the monarchy regained power, the Act of Uniformity was introduced, signaling a new era of persecution where clergy were forced to conform to the Church of England and the Book of Common Prayer. It wasn’t until 1689 that the 2LC was adopted.
Keeping the context in mind, we turn now to the mindset of the signatories (I use that word specifically instead of authors) of the 2LC. To illustrate, allow me to share some context about myself. I am a Baptist. My
“Our Hearty Agreement with Them” (cont.)
father was a Baptist as was his father before him. I made profession of Christ at the age of six and was baptized at the age of eight. I was raised on Scripture, and I knew it well as a child. Yet, sadly, despite my knowledge of Scripture, I had no knowledge of what it meant to have peace with God. My theology was egocentric, revolving around my actions and self-image in relation to God. In college, I found myself in a Presbyterian college ministry and church. I was drawn to this church by the theocentric nature of its worship and doctrine. What was soon apparent to me, by the mercy of the Holy Spirit, was that it was God who had saved me, and this was in spite of myself. Though I was, and still am, a Baptist, I not only joined this church, but attended its denominational seminary. Though there are some things I still disagree with, those things, while important, do not cause a break in fellowship. I am deeply indebted to the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church and infinitely grateful to my Heavenly Father that he placed me in such a place so as to deepen and galvanize the faith He gifted me. It has been my experience that there are many who hold to varying convictions on matters such as baptism and polity, but by the overwhelming witness of Scripture find peace and hope in the unchanging, sovereign providence of the Lord of Lords. This Reformed perspective can be found in both credo and paedo understandings of baptism.
Why share this? Because I find in my own Christian walk a deep love for the rich legacy and scholarship of the Presbyterian tradition. I am indebted to the faithfulness and diligence of my Presbyterian pastors, mentors, and professors. And I believe the same indebtedness holds true for the signers of both the Savoy Declaration, a Congregationalist statement, and the 2LC, a Baptist statement, to the WCF and its authors.
We will add a few words for conclusion, and give a more particular account of this our Declaration. In drawing up this Confession of Faith, we have had before us the Articles of Religion, approved and passed by both Houses of Parliament, after advice had with an Assembly of Divines, called together by them for that purpose. To which Confession, for the substance of it, we fully assent, as do our Brethren of New England, and the Churches also of Scotland, as each in their general Synods have testified. A few things we have added for obviating some erroneous Opinions, that have been more broadly and boldly here of late maintained by the Asserters, than in former times; and made other additions and alterations in method, here and there, and some clearer Explanations, as we found occasion.4
The Savoy Declaration has what I believe to be the fullest and most robust introduction of the related confessions. In it, the intent and thought processes of these Dissenters is laid bare. To be noted, the referenced parliament and confession above are the Long Parliament and the WCF. Notice the language that was employed, “the substance of it we fully assent.” There was no apparent desire to create a confession that was divorced from what the Assembly of Divines labored over. Rather, their purpose was to delineate the distinctives that required Independents to organize and practice the sacraments in their particular manner. A similar sentiment is expressed in the 2LC preface, “To The Judicious and Impartial Reader,”
And therefore we did conclude it necessary to express ourselves the more fully and distinctly; and also to fix on such a method as might be most comprehensive of those things we designed to explain our sense and belief of; and finding no defect in this regard in that fixed on by the Assembly, and, after them by those of the congregational way, we did readily conclude it best to retain the same order in our present
“Our Hearty Agreement with Them” (cont.)
Confession; and also when we observed that those last mentioned did in their Confessions (for reasons which seemed of weight both to themselves and others) choose not only to express their mind in words concurrent with the former in sense concerning all those articles wherein they were agreed, but also for the most part without any variation of the terms, we did in like manner conclude it best to follow their example in making use of the very same words with them both in these articles (which are very many) wherein our faith and doctrine are the same with theirs;
The signatories of the 2LC follow the same pattern as the Savoy Declaration. Notice the language that they use to refer to confessions that preceded theirs, phrases such as “finding no defect” and “follow their example.” These statements included not only the presentation, but also the content in so far as “our faith and doctrine are the same.” The statement continues,
And this we did the more abundantly to manifest our consent with both, in all the fundamental articles of the Christian religion, as also with many others whose orthodox confessions have been published to the world, on the behalf of the protestants in divers nations and cities; and also to convince all that we have no itch to clog religion with new words, but do readily acquiesce in that form of sound words which hath been in consent with the holy scriptures, used by others before us; hereby declaring before God, angels, and men, our hearty agreement with them, in that wholesome protestant doctrine, which with so clear evidence of scriptures they have asserted.
In the minds of these believers what they were formulating was not “new words . . . to clog religion” but a statement of distinctives that differentiated them in the midst of other orthodox believers. Their constant rule was to be held captive to the truth and authority of Scripture. In their mind, the Christian religion was not exclusive to their own way of thinking. Yet, for the sake of their conscience before God, they found it necessary to clarify what they believed and why they believed it. In their own terms, the confession was necessary to express that “sense and belief of [things]” that made them distinct. The mindset evident from these confessors was to establish their own identity within the stream of orthodoxy, that “wholesome protestant doctrine” to which they belonged.
A Common Thread
In the early seventeenth century, there was a fluidity to the denominational structures of the Separatists.5 Commonalities held by these Separatists were a rejection of the State Church and, for the most part, a staunchly Calvinistic soteriology.6 This group would include Congregationalists, Particular Baptists, Puritans and Presbyterians. Speaking of these Calvinistic confessors, B. R. White describes the relationship among Separatists and the formulation of their confessions,
The Calvinistic or Particular Baptist stood close to the clear-cut Calvinism of the seventeenth century Independents (as the Congregationalists were then most often known). The Particular Baptist Confession of 1644 was largely indebted to the Separatist Confession of 1596 with its Calvinism stiffened by William Ames (an early Independent) and probably the Council of Dort. Similarly, the most influential of all the Calvinistic Baptist Confessions of faith was that first accepted in 1677 and re-published at the Particular Baptist London Assembly of 1689. This was in fact a Baptist modification of the Independents’ Savoy confession (1658) which was in its turn a modification of the Presbyterian Westminster Confession (1647).7
“Our Hearty Agreement with Them” (cont.)
What can be seen from Whites’ observations is the common thread of a Reformed understanding among these groups. The 2LC served as much as an identity statement as it did a doctrinal declaration.8 This is explicitly expressed in prefaces attached to many of the first (1689) & subsequent printings,
We, the ministers and messengers of, and concerned for, upwards of one hundred baptized congregations in England and Wales (denying Arminianism), being met together . . .
From the preface to the 5th edition,
. . . with this confession, put forth by the ministers, elders, and brethren of above one hundred congregations of Christians baptized on profession of their faith in England and Wales, denying Arminianism, owning the doctrine of personal election and final perseverance . . .
The ministers, messengers, elders, and brethren of these churches were concerned with their particular identity as Baptists. But they were equally concerned for their identification with the Reformed and Calvinistic doctrine that was shared by other orthodox believers in England at the time.
Distinctives
Indeed, there was much in common, but there still remained a need to express differences. One distinctive, which played out in their adherence to their confessions, was the fundamental understanding of what a confession is. The opening quote of this article, taken from the preface to the Savoy Declaration, captures the intention and spirit of its authors and their understanding of what a confession is and is not. Though this specific group of authors was what we would call Congregationalist, I would argue that it well represents Baptist sentiment in that a confession is a means to express a common faith and salvation, and in no way to be made use of as an imposition. Though it is anachronistic, one can hardly have a discussion about Particular Baptists and not mention Charles Spurgeon. The following are his thoughts on the 2LC,
This little volume is not issued as an authoritative rule, or code of faith, whereby you are to be fettered, but as an assistance to you in controversy, a confirmation of faith, and a means of edification in righteousness. Here the younger members of our church will have a body of divinity in small compass, and by means of the Scriptural proofs, will be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in them. Be not ashamed of your faith; remember it is an ancient gospel of martyrs, confessors, reformers and saints. Above all, it is the truth of God, against which the gates of Hell cannot prevail. Let your lives adorn your faith, let your example adorn your creed. Above all live in Christ Jesus, and walk in Him, giving credence to no teaching but that which is manifestly approved of Him, and owned by the Holy Spirit. Cleave fast to the Word of God which is here mapped out for you.
The 2LC found its substance primarily in the Savoy Confession, which found its substance in the WCF. And a major purpose of the 2LC was to identify themselves with other Reformed believers. Yet, there was also a First London Confession issued by these Particular Baptists in 1644. It was intended to distance Particular Baptists from General Baptists, to disavow themselves from Anabaptists9, and (when updated) to counter the Quaker interpretation of Scripture.10 So why the designations of Particular and General? It is quite simply a description
“Our Hearty Agreement with Them” (cont.)
of the group’s view on the atonement. The General Baptists of seventeenth-century England were Arminian while the Particular Baptists held to a limited atonement. By no means is baptism a small thing. However, the atonement, God’s sovereignty, and the implications that result caused these Particular Baptists to distance themselves from the General Baptists, while simply distinguishing themselves from their Calvinistic comrades.
The ministers and elders of the Particular Baptist churches in seventeenth-century England saw no need in producing a confession when they had such a sound foundation in the WCF. It would be too simplistic to say that they copied it. But, rather, they added their “amen” to its substance, and then some alterations which they felt led to by their understanding of Scripture. While there are certainly distinctions, they are outweighed by the commonalties in substance.
Caleb W. Wright is a US Army Chaplain (CPT) endorsed by the Associated Gospel Churches. He received a MDiv, ’13 and is currently pursuing a Doctor of Ministry (DMin) at Erskine Seminary. Chaplain Wright and his wife, Ashley, have three children and are transitioning from Fort Hood, TX to Fort Benning, GA.
1 “The Savoy Declaration, 1658.” in Philip Schaff and David S. Schaff, eds., The Creeds of Christendom: With a History and Critical Notes. 6th ed., vol. 3 (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2007), 708.
2 Barrington Raymond White, The English Baptists of the Seventeenth Century. A History of the English Baptists, Vol. 1 (London: The Baptist Historical Society, 1983), 2.
3 Paul W. Smalley, “Reformed, Puritan, and Baptist: A Comparison of the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith to the 1646 Westminster Confession of Faith,” Puritan Reformed Journal 2, no. 2 (2010): 121–40; James Anderson. “Tabular Comparison of 1646 WCF and 1689 LBCF.” at https://www. proginosko.com/docs/wcf_lbcf.html. Accessed May 10, 2023.
4 Schaff, 714.
5 Gordon Belyea, “Review of Origins of Particular Baptist,” Themelios 32, no. 3 (2007): 40.
6 White, 8.
7 Ibid.
8 Smalley, 121.
9 Belyea, 45.
10 Peter Masters and Wakeman Trust, The Baptist Confession of Faith 1689, Or, the Second London Confession: With Scripture Proofs (London: Wakeman Trust, 1998), 5.
From English to Urdu
Notable Moments in the Translation History of the Westminster Standards
Matthew S. Miller, Associate Professor of Pastoral and Historical Theology
The Different Starting Points of Dort and Westminster
The Synod of Dort (16181-1619) and the Westminster Assembly (16431649) have exercised a greater influence over subsequent generations of Reformed Protestantism than any other synod or assembly of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. From the Synod of Dort came the Canons of Dort which, in the words of one of its most famous delegates, the Genevan theologian Giovanni Diodati, “shot off the Advocate’s head,” referring to the Synod’s utter decimation of Arminianism. 1 As the Synod of Dort was truly an international Synod, its confessional document – being composed in Latin – was taken back to the home countries of many of its delegates and received as a confessional authority. In Geneva, for example, the Canons of Dort were officially adopted in 1620, where they maintained confessional status for over a century. 2
The Synod of Dort did not compose a catechism, but it did take the significant step of endorsing one. The Synod of Dort officially approved the Heidelberg Catechism (1563) for use in homes, schools, and churches (including as a text for “catechetical preaching”).3 As a result, an already established catechism emerged from Dort with a towering status. As evidence of this, readers may be surprised to learn that as of 1999, the Heidelberg Catechism had “circulated more widely than any other book except the Bible, Thomas à Kempis’s The Imitation of Christ, and John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress.”4
The work of the Westminster Assembly has achieved its status by a different route. The Westminster Assembly was not an international synod, like the Synod of Dort, but a national assembly composed mostly of English Puritan ministers and theologians joined by some thirty members of the House of Commons and House of Lords, along with four eminent Scots ministers and three lay commissioners. Accordingly, the resulting documents – chiefly the Westminster Confession of Faith (henceforth WCF) and the Larger and Shorter Catechisms (henceforth Catechisms) – were not composed in Latin but in English and would travel beyond Scotland along the paths of migration of an English-speaking people. Thus, the broader influence of the Westminster Assembly on the Reformed world at large was not as immediate as that of the Synod of Dort, as evidenced by the fact that Francis Turretin’s Institutes of Elenctic Theology (1679-1685) makes not one reference to the WCF or Catechisms.
With time, however, the influence of the Westminster Assembly on the broader Reformed world would increase— with time and with translations, that is. One way of tracking the reception of the WCF and Catechisms into the life and teaching of non-English-speaking churches is by tracing the timeline of the translation of these documents into other tongues. Granted, the translation of any work into a new language does not tell us whether that work was received by many or by few, or whether it was accorded a status either high or low. Additional measures would be needed to make those determinations. But it does mark a significant moment in the document’s own history and, in the case of Christian creeds and confessions, becomes part of the story of the church’s mission to make disciples of all nations, “teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:19).
From English to Urdu (cont.)
“That
Melchizedek of Translations” - The Mysterious Origins of the Latin and German Translations
Our brief story of the translation of the WCF and Catechisms begins with the great leap from English into Latin, the lingua franca of Europe at the time of the Assembly (and up into the eighteenth century). Among the Westminster divines were many distinguished classicists who excelled in Latin and Greek. The Westminster Assembly could easily have commissioned any number of its members to produce a precise and “official” Latin translation of its documents to aid their recognition among the continental European Protestant churches. It did not. But we know that a Latin translation appeared as early as 1656.5 As to the translator or translators, here we encounter contradictory reports and suppositions.
Philip Schaff presents an English and Latin side-by-side of the WCF in his The Creeds of Christendom (1919), reporting that the Latin translation was done by “G. D.” (and published first in Cambridge in 1656). Some have supposed “G. D.” to refer to William Dillingham (1617-1689) of Emmanuel College in Cambridge. Dillingham certainly has the credentials of a proper candidate for our translator, having, among other things, published a biography in Latin of Archbishop Ussher, whose Irish Articles of Religion (1615) lay at back of much of the WCF. Others have supposed our translator to be James Duport (1606-1679) of Trinity College at Cambridge, remembered in part for his rules for “Pupils and Schollers” (1660) containing advice for Cambridge students, which included “Read an Author in his owne language and trust not too much to Translations.”6 Schaff reports that neither the librarians in London and Edinburgh, nor other learned scholars he consulted, were able to determine to whom the initials “G. D.” finally belong.7
The earliest known translation of the WCF and Catechisms was not, however, into Latin. That title belongs to the German translation which first appeared in 1648. This was a significant year in Germany for the signing of the Peace of Westphalia in Münster that brought an end to the terrible devastation of the Thirty Years War and, as part of that accord, established the legality of the Reformed churches in German states ruled by Reformed princes.8 Those churches began their new era with the WCF and Catechisms available in their German tongue. But as to its translator, whether on account of his humility or on account of history’s subsequent inattention, here again we find no answer. B. B. Warfield thus speaks of it as “this Melchizedek of versions” being “[w]ithout father, without mother.”9
Early into Dutch and Late into French
Among all the European churches that took an interest in the happenings in the English and Scottish churches, none surpassed that of the Reformed churches in the Netherlands. Their interest owes to the large communities of English-Scottish immigrants who settled in the Netherlands, numbering in the tens of thousands including more than 350 ministers.10 (It should be remembered that America’s “Pilgrims” did not leave England straightaway for Plymouth Rock, but first moved to Leiden in 1610, staying there for ten years before setting sail to the New World in 1620.)
The influence of the English-Scottish immigrants of Puritan persuasion in the Netherlands gave rise to a significant movement in the Netherlands called the Dutch Nadere Reformatie. Generally interpreted as “the Dutch counterpart to English Puritanism,” the Nadere Reformatie (“Second Reformation” or “Further Reformation”)
From English to Urdu (cont.)
underscored the importance of marrying orthodox Reformed doctrine with an emphasis on practical holiness.11 In this context, it comes as no surprise that the WCF would be brought into the Dutch language as early as 1651, the work of Nicolaes van Ravesteyn.12 An abiding interest in the WCF and Catechisms among the Dutch Reformed Churches is evidenced by a long history of new and updated translations, with the most recent we have found by G. van Rongen published in 1986 (with an updated edition in 1989 that includes some corrections to the translation).13 Given the early translations into German (1648) and Dutch (1651), one might expect to find early editions in French during the same time period. However, we have not found any such parallels. If there were early translations of the Westminster documents into French, their possessors faced a tough road ahead, as the Catholic King Louis XIV would, beginning in 1660, initiate a deliberate process of rolling back the liberties that the French Reformed believers (the Huguenots) had enjoyed in France since the Edict of Nantes in 1598.14 The crushing year came in 1685, when Louis XIV took the momentous step of revoking the Edict of Nantes, making the Reformed faith illegal in France with the effect that hundreds of thousands of Huguenots fled France for the four corners of earth. Nonetheless, the Reformed faith lived on in what we might call “underground” churches for the next century and eventually experienced a small but notable resurgence in the twentieth century.
Two of the figures in this resurgence of the French Reformed faith were pastor-theologians Pierre-Charles Marcell (1910-1992) and Pierre Courthial (1914-2009), both of whom were stoutly confessional men. In 1976, Marcell translated the Westminster Shorter Catechism into French for La Revue Reformée. In 1988, Courthial took the next step, working together with Danièlle Berthoud to translate and publish La Confession de Foi de Westminster 15 These very recent translations of the WCF and Catechisms into French are the first done by French speakers that we are aware of. They have served the needs not only of Reformed churches in France, but also in Quebec, where a small denomination, l’Église réformée de Quebec (EQR), counts this French translation of the Westminster Confession of Faith among the confessional documents to which it adheres.16
Space does not permit us to delve into the translations of the WCF and Catechisms into Spanish and Portuguese, though we note the significance of the latter for the large Presbyterian population in Brazil. Warfield reports that when the Synod of Brazil was formed in 1888, one of the actions taken at its inaugural meeting was to form a committee to revise the Portuguese translation of the WCF done by American Presbyterian missionaries in 1876.17 It appears to be frequently the case that a first translation of the WCF done by missionaries serves the strategic and short-term purpose of introducing the confession, but a subsequent improvement of the translation done by native speakers is needed for long-term use.
Into Polish, Lithuanian, and (Updated) Urdu
One of the newest mission fields of the ARP Church is the former Soviet bloc country, Lithuania, where World Witness missionaries Frank and Emily Van Dalen now serve in the city of Vilnius. The Shorter Catechism was first translated into Lithuania and published in 2005 in the book Šviesa Lietuvai (“Light to Lithuania”). More recently, the Union of Evangelical Churches in Lithuania (LEBB) proposed to the Lithuanian Evangelical Reformed Church that they undertake a joint venture of translating and publishing the WCF in Lithuanian. The main translator was Valdas Bačkulis (of the LEBB) with Holger Lahayne (of the Lithuanian Evangelical Reformed Church) editing the translation and writing the introduction. Out of their labors, the Westminster Confession of Faith in Lithuanian came to light in 2016.18
From English to Urdu (cont.)
Turning from missions work in one former Soviet bloc country to another, the members of a World Witness church plant in Warsaw, Poland, have had a direct hand in recent translations of the WCF and catechisms into Polish.19 The first translation of the WCF into that language was done in the early 1990s (author not known at the time of this article) and published in a Polish anthology of creeds in 1995.20 This translation was subsequently updated by a Baptist pastor, Dr. Mateusz Wichary, which has been the primary version of the WCF in Polish circulating online since. An updated of these previous translations, done by Mateusz Kupiec and published by the Tolle Lege Institute, came to light in 2022. And more recently still, an altogether fresh translation into Polish of the WCF (not a revision of existing translations) was completed this year by Mariej Rogatko (a member of the Redeemer Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Warsaw). Joined to it in a single volume were fresh translations of the Larger and Shorter catechisms by Filip Sylwestrowicz, who in addition to being a member of same congregation is also a Student of Theology in Catawba Presbytery and a PhD student at Oxford.21
Mention of these two former Soviet bloc countries may prompt the reader to wonder, what of the WCF and Catechisms in Russian? According to a native Russian who now serves as a PCA pastor and theologian in a former Soviet bloc country (a personal friend whose name and location I am not printing), the first known translation of the WCF and Catechisms into Russian appeared in 2000. Though the specific translator is not named, the project was undertaken by the “Reformation Society” in Moscow with financial support from the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. My contact reports that a new Russian translation of the WCF and Catechisms is in the works—one that is less wooden and easier to understand.
From these newer mission fields of the ARP church in Lithuania and Poland to one of the oldest, we conclude by looking at the WCF and Catechisms in Pakistan. As a result of ARP missionary endeavors in Pakistan toward the end of the nineteenth century (when it was under British rule), the ARP Church of Pakistan was established in the early twentieth century and numbers approximately 150,000 members today. The official language of Pakistan, Urdu, stands in many rankings as the tenth-most-spoken language in the world (it is also spoken by a significant portion of the population of India).
B. B. Warfield reports that the WCF and Shorter Catechism were translated into Urdu in 1848 by order of the Synod of India (Pakistan became an independent country in 1947). 22 However, if Warfield’s report is accurate, the resulting Urdu translation seems not to have found its way into the life of the ARP Church in Pakistan. According to Rev. Zeeshan Sadiq, an ARP pastor in Pakistan and current ThM student at Erskine Theological Seminary, the Shorter Catechism was first translated into Urdu for use by the ARP Church in Pakistan in the 1990s by “our ARP Mission’s ministry known as Christian Discipleship Ministry.” 23 At that time, no translations of the WCF or Larger Catechism were known to the ARP Church in Pakistan.
However, just last year, Dr. Eliah Massey, a Pakistani and RPCNA missionary (who was present at Bonclarken for the concurrent meetings of the ARP and RPCNA Synods in 2020), translated the WCF and Larger Catechism into Urdu. He additionally provided a fresh translation of the Shorter Catechism. These documents are now available on the Urdu Center for Reformed Theology website and comprise a significant milestone for both the ARP Church in Pakistan and the history of the WCF and Catechisms.24
From English to Urdu (cont.)
Translating the Westminster Standards and Fulfilling the Great Commission
Comparing our present day with that of the great seventeenth century, we can say that if the Canons of Dort, composed in Latin, were poised to race through the European Reformed Protestant world in the seventeenth century, that privilege now belongs to the documents of the Westminster Assembly, composed in the language that has since become the clear – and truly global – lingua franca of our day. Even still, our short history shows that those ministering in non-English speaking cultures have endeavored – and continue to endeavor – to bring the WCF and Catechisms into the native tongue of the peoples whom they serve.
The WCF and Catechisms are not on par with Scripture, to be sure. But it is from their faithfulness to the Scriptures that they derive their great value. Many would agree with the late R. C. Sproul when he wrote, “I would argue that the Westminster Standards are the most precise and accurate summaries of the content of biblical Christianity ever set forth in creedal form . . . in my judgment, no historic confession surpasses the eloquence, grandeur, and theological accuracy of the Westminster Confession of Faith.” 25 If we share Sproul’s assessment, then we would have a great interest in supporting the translation of the Westminster Standards into the languages of the nations. Such excellent “summaries of the content of biblical Christianity” serve the church’s mission of “mak[ing] disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.”
Matthew S. Miller (PhD candidate, University of Bristol) is Associate Professor of Pastoral and Historical Theology at Erskine Seminary. He has also translated two books from French into English by Pierre Courthial. He received a ThM, ‘15, and a DMin, ’20, from Erskine Seminary. If the reader has any information to contribute to the topic in this article, or sees any errors in this article needing correction, he invites you to email him at mmiller@erskine.edu.
From English to Urdu (cont.)
1 Quoted in M. M. Dewar, “The British Delegation at the Synod of Dort—1618-1619,” The Evangelical Quarterly 46.2 (1974): 115.
2 In 1725, in a rejection of their Reformed orthodox heritage and pivot toward the Enlightenment, Geneva’s Company of Pastors voted to abrogate the Formula Consensus Helvetica and the Canons of Dort, rendering the Genevan Church “confessionless.” James I. Good, History of the Swiss Reformed Church (Philadelphia: Board of the Reformed Church in the U.S., 1913), 279; quoted in Martin I. Klauber, “Jean-Alphonse Turretini and the Abrogation of the Formula Consensus in Geneva,” Westminster Theological Journal 53 (1991): 336.
3 See Willem Jan op ’t Hof, “The Heidelberg Catechism in Preaching and Teaching,” in The Church’s Book of Comfort, ed. Willem van ’t Spijker (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 2009), 187-250.
4 Joel R. Beeke and Sinclair B. Ferguson, eds., Reformed Confessions Harmonized (Grand Rapids: Baker Book, 1999), x.
5 B. B. Warfield, “The Printing of the Westminster Confession of Faith,” Presbyterian and Reformed Review 13 no. 50 (1902): 254-255.
6 See “Advice for fresheners in 1660: ‘Goe not gadding and gossiping from Chamber to Chamber…’” at https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/advicefor-freshers-in-1660-goe-not-a-gadding-and-gossiping-from-chamber-to-chamber. Last accessed May 4, 2023.
7 Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom: With a History and Critical Notes, vol. 1 (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1931), 754.
8 The principle at play here was that of the 1555 Peace of Augsburg known as cuius regio, eius religio (whose the region, his the religion), meaning Catholic German princes could establish the Catholic religion in their region, and Protestant German princes the Protestant religion in theirs.
9 Warfield, “The Printing of the Westminster Confession,” 255.
10 Joel Beeke, “The Dutch Second Reformation,” in Wilhelmus à Brakel, The Christians Reasonable Service, Vol. 1, trans. Bartel Elshout (Grand Rapids: Reformation Heritage Books, 1992), lxxxvi-lxxxvii.
11 Ibid. Beeke describes the movement’s impetus in these words: “[Pastors and theologians of] the Dutch Second Reformation . . . faced the painful reality that the majority of parishioners had not become more spiritual as a result of the Reformation. Consequently, in opposition to sin and complacency, an urgent, zealous call went out for fresh personal, church, and societal reform: The scriptural appeal for sanctification must be zealously pursued; Reformation doctrine must be lived” (ibid., xc-xci).
12 See the preface to the second edition of De Westminster Confessie met de Grote en de Kleine Catechismus, trans. G. van Rongen (1986; Uitgeverij De Vuurbaak, 1989), 5. Warfield was incorrect about the Dutch translation when he wrote in 1902, “There does not seem to exist any version of the Westminster Confession in Dutch or French or Italian or any of the tongues of northern Europe,” but he may be forgiven, given that even the lengthy introduction to the first edition of van Rongen’s 1986 Dutch edition failed to note this first 1651 translation (Warfield, “The Printing of the Westminster Confession of Faith,” 256; De Westminster Confessie, 5).
13 Ibid.
14 King Louis XIV inherited the throne on May 15, 1643, just six weeks before the Westminster Assembly was first convened. But as he was only four years and eight months old at the time, it was not until much later that he began to exercise his reign properly—and then, beginning in 1661, to the horror of his ministers and officials, in an “absolute” way.
15 La Confession de Foi de Westminster, trans. Danièlle Berthoud and Pierre Courthial (Ed. Kerygma: Aix-en-provence, 1988). In his preface to this work, Courthial concludes: “During these times when so many men, women, and children are ‘tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes’ found in the various forms of humanism and contemporary ideologies, we commend to the readers this Confession which will contribute, Lord-willing, to the setting right of hearts and minds.”
16 The EQR was formed in 1988 as the fruit of joint mission efforts by the CRC and PCA and is now a sister church of the ARP through membership in NAPARC. It has adopted as its confessional standards the Three Forms of Unity, The Heidelberg Catechism, The Confession of La Rochelle (1571), and The Westminster Confession of Faith. See “The Doors Open in Quebec,” https://opc.org/new_horizons/NH01/06e.html. Last accessed May 8, 2023.
17 Warfield, “The Printing of the Westminster Confession,” 269.
18 Email from Rev. Dr. Frank Van Dalen to author, May 4, 2023; email from Holger Lahayne to author, May 5, 2023.
19 All of the information in this paragraph taken from an email from Mr. Filip Sylwestrowicz (Student of Theology, Catawba Presbytery) to Dr. Mark Ross, May 10, 2023, shared with the author.
20 “Konfesja westminsterka,” in Wyznania wiary protestantyzmu. Wybór tekstów źródłowych, ed. Z. Pasek (Kraków: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego, 1995).
21 Westminsterskie wyznanie wiary oraz Mały i Duży katechizm, trans. by Maciej Rogatko and Filip Sylwestrowicz (Kraków: Wydawnictwo MW, 2023).
22 Warfield, “The Printing of the Westminster Confession,” 266.
23 Email from Rev. Zeeshan Sadiq to author, May 12, 2023.
24 Email from Van Dalen to author, May 4, 2023; email from Rev. Lee Shelnutt to author, May 4, 2023; email from Rev. Zeeshan Sadiq to author, May 12, 2023. Dr. Massey’s translations of the WCF and Catechisms into Urdu can be accessed from the “Creeds & Confessions” page of the Urdu Center for Reformed Theology website: https://ucrt.org/creeds-confessions. On Dr. Massey’s presence at the ARP and RPCNA concurrent meetings in 2020, see “Working Together and Separately,” at https://rpwitness.org/article/working-together-and-separately. Last accessed May 8, 2023.
25 R. C. Sproul, Truth We Confess: A Layman’s Guide to the Westminster Confession of Faith, vol. 1 (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2006), xiii.
Warfield and Westminster
David P. Smith, Adjunct Professor of Historical Theology
Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield (1851-1921), who taught at Princeton Theological Seminary from 1887-1921, is arguably the greatest American biblical and theological scholar. While growing up on a Lexington, Kentucky cattle farm, Warfield was nurtured in the categories and content of the Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF). By the age of six, he had memorized the Shorter Catechism, along with the Scripture proofs, and then went on to the Larger Catechism. Saturated in the categories and content of the WCF, Warfield embarked upon his adult ministerial labors expressing his commitment to both Scripture and the Standards, not because by beginning with the Confession he could make Scripture fit it, but rather, as he stated, by “commencing with the Scriptures I cannot make them teach anything else” 1 According to Warfield, it was in the Reformed Confessions that the gospel was expressed “in its highest purity” and with the WCF where it “reaches a perfection of statement never elsewhere achieved.” 2 But, according to Warfield, we should not think of the system of doctrine or theology expressed by the Confession as merely revealing the rational or logical relations that held between the doctrines of the system. Instead, the WCF warranted that we think of the doctrines as an organism, so that the doctrines were only best understood when they were comprehended in their organic relations. Such an understanding meant recognizing the supernatural person revealed in and by the Confession’s doctrines—the Lord Jesus Christ—and how his purpose of saving and sanctifying sinners was accomplished as sinners grew in their understanding and application of the doctrines expressed in the WCF.
Warfield never wrote a traditional single or multi-volume systematic theology text. Instead, his views on Christian theology or doctrine have to be gleaned from his numerous occasional writings. Some are long, academic discourses, while others are shorter more popular pieces. Thankfully, a great many of these were brought together in two major projects after Warfield’s death. The first was a ten-volume set (The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield, hereafter Works) pulled together shortly after his death, with each volume in the set dedicated to a particular topic or area of his scholarship. The second was done about fifty years after he passed and is a two-volume set of his Selected Shorter Writings. Volume six of The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield is titled The Westminster Assembly and Its Work, and throughout his Selected Shorter Writings we find several essays on either The Westminster Assembly or the WCF.
The Knowledge of God
Warfield was compelled to write as much as he did on these matters because of the criticisms and condemnation of the WCF from within the Presbyterian church during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Such negative assessments of the WCF were significantly fueled by Protestant Liberal theology that had been advancing in influence throughout the nineteenth century within not merely the Presbyterian church but through all Protestant denominations. Warfield identified Protestant Liberal Theology as naturalistic or teaching that the physical, natural world by itself could provide and sufficiently explain Christianity. Its theology, therefore, was also rationalistic, or treating Christian doctrine and beliefs as limited to and determined by human reason. Warfield knew God to have supernaturally created human reasoning, and thus, the rational component
Warfield and Westminster (cont.)
of Christian doctrine had to be understood within the broader context of every person’s relationship to the living God, whether Christian or not. Thus, Warfield’s analysis and application of the WCF led him to understand the apprehension and comprehension of the truth as it is in Jesus from an organic perspective, because these matters were not merely about ideas and concepts, but the divine person, the Lord Jesus Christ.
To think in accordance with Scripture and the WCF was to recognize that what God had decreed was accomplished in two works—creation and providence (WCF IV and V; SC Qs. 8, 9, and 11). In Warfield’s essay “The Significance of the Confessional Doctrine of the Decree” he made it clear that in chapter three of the WCF the “divine teleology” is affirmed so that we have in it the assertion “that whatever occurs in the universe that God has made, occurs not to his amazed astonishment, or against his unavailing efforts, but in accordance with his plan, which was framed in eternity, and is being wrought out in time by means of his works of creation and providence” (SSW 1:96). For Warfield, this divine teleology was the essence of Calvinism. God’s works of creation and providence were also the ways to understand the organic nature of Christian doctrine.
If we are to understand Warfield’s lofty conception of the systematic theology expressed by the WCF, we must recognize that he regarded systematic theology to be central to all human knowledge claims. Here is also the key to understanding his view of apologetics, which, despite the misrepresentation of his scholarship, was not evidentialist. For Warfield, systematic theology is the “Queen of the Sciences,” and only rightly understood as God revealing himself to his redeemed people. All human knowledge in any subject sphere cannot keep from being theological, because ultimately God is both presupposed in all knowledge claims and revealed in all creation. The relationship of theology to other subject matters of human knowledge meant that theology was not “so above them, however, as not to be also a constituent member of the closely interrelated and mutually interacting organism of the sciences” (Works 9:68). Note Warfield’s reference to the “organism of the sciences.” Regarding this relationship of systematic theology to the “mutually interacting organism of the sciences,” or all other branches of human knowledge (this is what he meant by sciences) he claimed that, “[A]s all nature, whether mental or material, may be conceived of as only the mode in which God manifests Himself, every science which investigates nature and ascertains its laws is occupied with the discovery of the modes of the divine action, and as such might be considered a branch of theology” (Works 9:69). Theology “enters into the structure of every other science” (Works 9:69). With respects to God and our knowledge, Warfield claimed that, “[A]ll speculation takes us back to Him; all inquiry presupposes Him; and every phase of science consciously or unconsciously rests at every step on the science that makes Him known. Theology, thus, as the science which treats of God, lies at the root of all sciences.” Thus, in his praise of the WCF, Warfield was not merely expressing that it was the right systematic theology mandated by Scripture, but also the indispensable root to a robust Christian education, and Christian view of any and every subject matter of human knowledge. All this was related to how Warfield viewed the biblical doctrine of revelation expressed by the WCF.
A Unified Revelation
In his view of the biblical doctrine of revelation, Warfield stressed the organic nature of it in that he referred to two species of revelation—general and special, or natural and supernatural, or creational and soteriological, or saving (Works 1:6). Each species of revelation produced a different kind of knowledge. The natural or creational revelation provided knowledge of God suitable to us as creatures, while the special, supernatural, or
Warfield and Westminster (cont.)
soteriological revelation gives knowledge of God that will “rescue broken and deformed sinners from their sin and its consequences” (Works 1:3). While it has been tirelessly repeated that Warfield and some of the other Old Princeton theologians failed to account for sins effect on human reasoning, this claim is shown to be rather preposterous when you actually read what Warfield and the other Princetonians wrote. In fact, Warfield stated that people’s rescue from sin was “the core of Christianity” (SSW 1:47) and repeatedly addressed the influence of sin on human reasoning and how salvation remedied the effects of sin on it, and, at times, he went into intricate detail on the matter. Indeed, one cannot understand his whole view of revelation unless one pays attention to his affirmation that because of the presence of sin which destroyed “communion with God” while “obscuring the knowledge of Him derived from Nature, another mode of revelation was necessitated, having also another content, adapted to the new relation to God and the new conditions of the intellect, heart and will brought about by sin” (SSW 1:47). Such a statement was clear echoes of WCF VI.2. And so, Warfield identified God’s special revelation that saves sinners from sin as not merely having a supernatural source in God but having a supernatural mode. It was why he not only called it a “soteriological” revelation but “a continuous divine activity directed to destroying the power of sin” (SSW 1:29). It is “a historic process, an organic system” that builds the kingdom of God, restores the cosmos so that all things might be summed up in Christ (SSW 1:29).
Yet it is vital, according to Warfield, to recognize the implications of what the WCF affirms about the relationship between these two species of revelation. They form “one organic whole” (SSW 1:27). In other words, God’s saving revelation of himself is in organic union with creation itself so that we only rightly think of his saving revelation when we recognize it was given to address “the changed conditions” in creation and “to conduct it surely onward to its originally contemplated end” (SSW 1:28). Thus, Warfield affirmed, along with many others in the history of the church, that God’s grace restores nature.
In this “organic process of revelation occasioned by sin” there were three emphases. First, because “[S]in brought mankind under the condemnation of God: a special revelation of God to sinners must needs lay its stress, therefore, on a new aspect of God’s character: God the redeemer of sinners must become its central disclosure” (SSW 1:28). Second, because sin had destroyed our “natural communion with God” we stood in need of “a new channel of communion” with God, and “its method must necessarily become mediatorial” (SSW 1:28). Thirdly, because “[S]in had dulled man’s conscience and blinded his perception of divine things: a special revelation of God to sinners, therefore, must needs include an immanent movement of God’s Spirit on man’s heart restoring his capacity for the reception of divine knowledge” (SSW 1:28). All of it “supernatural to the core” (SSW 1:28).
Thus, God’s revealing of himself was not only systematic in character, because it revealed how all aspects of creation and redemption revealed and were related to the one, true and living God—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—but also organic, because God is life itself. Christian systematic theology, in other words, is not first and foremost about understanding the logical relations that hold between the doctrines, although it is that, but how the doctrines are alive, mediating the living God to sinners. This is why Warfield regarded systematic theology to be “indispensable” to the preacher because it “is nothing other than the saving truth of God presented in systematic form” (SSW 2:281). Such theology does not “terminate upon the intellect” because “the revelations of Scripture” “were not given merely to enlighten the mind” but “given through the intellect to beautify the life” (SSW 2:671). Since “[T]he natural man cannot receive the things of the Spirit of God,” Scriptural revelation must be used by the Spirit of God to “first convert the soul before they are fully comprehended by the intellect” (SSW 2:671). This is what gives a person “right reason” (SSW 2:98-99).
Warfield and Westminster (cont.)
In these emphases we see that Warfield had an organic understanding of systematic theology, not an ideological one, and he believed that it was either the explicit affirmations of the WCF or the necessary implications of those affirmations that supported such a view. Warfield was not only a Shorter Catechism boy, but a Westminster man.
David P. Smith (PhD, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) is Adjunct Professor of Historical Theology at Erskine Seminary and pastor of Covenant Fellowship (ARP) Church in Greensboro, NC. He is the author of B.B. Warfield’s Scientifically Constructive Theological Scholarship.
1 B. B. Warfield, “Inspiration and Criticism,” in The Works of Benjamin B. Warfield, Vol. 1 (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1927: Reprint Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1991), 396.
2 B. B. Warfield, “The Significance of the Westminster Standards as a Creed,” in Selected Shorter Writings, vol. 2, p. 561.
Reflections on Worship after Westminster
R. J. Gore Jr., Professor of Systematic Theology, Dean Emeritus
The Westminster Assembly (1643-1653) made enormous strides in returning worship to its historic, biblical roots. The attempted solution to the historic problems, the definitive Puritan Regulative Principle, did not itself develop in a vacuum. Rather, there were definite historical and theological forces that gave impetus to the rise of Puritanism and led to the mature position expressed at Westminster and adopted by the Presbyterian churches. Those forces may accurately be described as the Anglican-Puritan controversy. This controversy covered more than a century and existed from its incipient form under Henry VIII until its final struggles under Charles II. 1
It is difficult to address all that the Westminster Divines sought to accomplish. But this much is easy enough to see: “The assembly at Westminster rejected the partial reformation embraced by Episcopalians and Lutherans. Quite simply, Presbyterians refused to tolerate the liturgical ‘rags of Rome’”! 2 As Chad Van Dixhoorn puts it, “it is Scripture that teaches us that the only acceptable way of worshipping God is his way.” 3 He explains further: “The call to do in worship what is prescribed in the Bible, rather than merely to avoid what is proscribed in the Bible, is an important regulating principle for worship.”4 Robert Letham echoes this understanding of the Assembly’s disapproval of Roman Catholic, Lutheran, and High Church Anglican worship, writing “the Reformed churches held that worship is to be determined by God, and its basis and content are to be found in Scripture. Worship is to be in accordance with what Scripture requires; that alone is to be our guide. In contrast with the position that what is not forbidden by Scripture is permissible, the Reformed held that only what Scripture prescribes is permissible.” 5
With this limitation in mind, how, then, should the Church, specifically, those who embrace the teachings of the Westminster Standards on “Religious Worship and the Sabbath Day,” deal with the challenges set before us today? This, I must confess, is much harder to answer than I would like to admit. When I was researching for my dissertation back in the 1980s, I noted there were “at least three significant, diverse patterns of worship,” namely traditional formal Presbyterian worship, “New Life” contemporary worship, and resurgent forms of liturgical worship.6 My concern was less about the particulars of these worship trends than about their relationship to the Puritan Regulative Principle. Now, a few decades later, there are some other concerns that I would like to address.
Some thirty years ago, an essay appeared that attempted to analyze theological trends in Presbyterian churches. Robert Metcalf of the Christian Studies Center in Memphis, Tennessee wrote an essay in which he divided Presbyterians into three types, which he called “Pies, Docs, and Kuyps.” 7 The “Pies” are the Pietists who emphasize personal experience, inward religion, personal devotion, and the development of relationships. The “Docs” are the Doctrinalists, the “Truly Reformed,” who emphasize doctrinal correctness, confessional faithfulness, and orthodox preaching and teaching. Finally, the “Kuyps” are the Kuyperians, those Reformed Christians who take seriously the emphasis of Abraham Kuyper, Dutch Prime Minister and founder of the Free University of Amsterdam, that the Christian is to reform all of life. Kuyper once said that “there is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, ‘Mine!’”8 For the “Kuyps,” the Christian is to redeem all of life, and so they engage our culture, applying Christian principles to many areas of life, such as social action, political engagement, and artistic endeavor.
Reflections on Worship after Westminster (cont.)
As we have noted, each of these types of Reformed Christianity emphasizes an aspect of the truth that is worthy of our affirmation. But each also provides the potential, and all too often the realization, of a Christianity that is imbalanced, possibly even distorted.
Now, if it is true that there are types of Reformed thinking, might it not be reasonable to suggest there are also types of Reformed worship? Indeed, this is the suggestion offered by James B. Jordan, one of the more colorful writers in the area of Reformed worship. Consider, for example, the Pietists. Jordan criticizes them for their tendency “to reduce worship to the volitional acts of men, individually, in their prayer closets primarily, and not primarily in the exercise of corporate public worship.”9 I think this is fair for the more extreme Pietists, but streaks of Pietism run throughout the contemporary worship movement in the Reformed community.
Much that takes place in contemporary worship is simply the devotional life of the cell group, the collegia pietatis, the Methodist Society, or the Shepherding Group projected large on to the screen of congregational worship. “Body Life” or “New Life” were often the watchwords at the start of this movement. Corporate prayer is focused on inward piety, personal needs, and individual triumphs over temptation. Much of the music in contemporary worship is testimonial and individualistic. Throughout all of Pietistic worship is the theme that worship must be meaningful, and meaningful worship moves the worshiper spiritually and emotionally. The role of the affections, if not always the religious affections, is intrinsic to Reformed Worship with a Pietistic strain.
Pietists are not overly bothered by concerns for doctrinal precision or adherence to denominational books of worship. Indeed, they often view such strictures as the relics of a dead orthodoxy that would quench the Spirit of true worship if followed too closely. Moreover, there is a streak of biblicism in Pietistic worship as the “Pies” seek to return the gathered assembly to the plain, warm, uncomplicated worship of the New Testament Church. Often, pragmatics (if it works, let’s use it) determines the nature of worship for Pietists. The Pietist is concerned with worship as Inspiration.
Consider, secondly, the Doctrinalists. Jordan says, “the tendency of ‘Docs’ is to reduce worship to a Bible lesson or sermon, delivered coolly or with passion, but essentially an exercise in the communication of information.” For the Doctrinalists, worship is another intellectual exercise, a spiritual activity that looks vaguely like a doctoral seminar in Systematic Theology. Worship is largely a mental exercise, and anything that smacks of enthusiasm is suspect. After all, “God is Spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in Spirit and in truth” (John 4:24, emphasis mine).
Among the Doctrinalists, there is a great deal of concern about the proper regulation of worship. The Church must avoid the current trends that undermine the objective truth of Scripture, that make worship dependent on human devices and emotional manipulation. Like revenge, worship is a dish that is best served cold, or, at least, slightly chilled. For many Doctrinalists, truly Reformed worship is worship that is commanded in Scripture and only that which is commanded. For many this regulation not only includes the elements of worship, such as prayer and the sacraments, but also excludes certain circumstances of worship, such as the use of instruments or the singing of anything other than psalms. You would not expect to find Special Services among the Doctrinalists, and you are more likely to find an Imprecatory Prayer than a Christmas Eve Candlelight Service.
Often the Doctrinalist can point to a particular manifestation of worship that is to be preferred. Sometimes this is Calvin’s Geneva of the sixteenth century or the Scotland of John Knox. Perhaps it is the worship of seventeenth century England as directed by the Westminster Divines. Or maybe the worship of the antebellum Southern Presbyterians, `a la Thornwell or Dabney. Whatever Golden Age is preferred, and there is disagreement over which period best represents “true worship,” the Doctrinalists believe if we can just “do it the way they did it,” many problems in today’s churches will be solved.
Reflections on Worship after Westminster (cont.)
The Doctrinalists run a tight ship and spend a great deal of energy debating who is the most shipshape of them all. Furthermore, it is not uncommon to find frequent mutinies, judicial proceedings, bodies thrown overboard, and occasionally a healthy round of walking the plank. Doctrinalists are not highly skilled in the fine art of winning friends and influencing people. After all, that is the work of the Holy Spirit, and heaven forbid that they confuse that work with any form of human manipulation. The Word is all that is needed. Just dish it out; shoot straight, and, apparently, shoot often. Less concerned with what is than what has been, the Doctrinalist is concerned with worship as Repristination, a return to the original pure state.
Thirdly, consider the Kuyperians. Jordan notes that their tendency is “to downplay the importance of worship.” While it is true that Kuyperians have a tendency to see all of life’s activities as existing on a parallel line, there is another possible tendency in those who embrace Reformed worship from this perspective. Namely, their emphasis on the surrounding culture and the importance of cultural connections often leads to cultural encroachment on the cult. That is, elements of the larger culture so influence worship that music, drama, and the arts find new significance and acceptance.
Earlier Reformed concerns that the Church should maintain some distance from the prevailing culture in its worship of God are replaced by intentional efforts to draw lines of connection that make the Church’s worship relevant, perhaps even “interesting” to the watching world. While the Pietists are having small group meetings for fellowship and prayer, and the Doctrinalists are meeting at the Pub to discuss which Reformed Theologian is the most Truly Reformed, the Kuyperians have scheduled meetings for their Sanctuary Drama Team or are choreographing the latest dance steps for their Liturgical Dance Troupe.
Kuyperians believe that all of life belongs to Christ, and subsequently belongs in the Sanctuary on Sunday morning as well. Refusing to compartmentalize, they tend not to discriminate either. Not content to allow realized eschatology to work itself out, Kuyperians are actively engaged in “helping the Kingdom come.” Less concerned about what is than what could be, the Kuyperian focuses on worship as Transformation.
Finally, Jordan goes a step beyond Metcalf and adds a fourth type which he calls “Lits.” For Jordan, “Lits” do not constitute a separate worship type, but should characterize the approach of all “Pies, Docs, and Kuyps” to the worship of God. However, in the forty years since his article, we now can distinguish a true, fourth type of Reformed Worship, the Liturgicalists. The Liturgicalists are scandalized over the lack of historical consciousness in Reformed Churches. The Reformed Church today has little awareness of how the Church of the Reformation worshipped, much less serious knowledge of worship in the early Church.
One of the things that unites the “Lits” is their rejection of the other types of worship. “Lits” find the contemporary worship of the Kuyperians not historically worthy; the biblical simplicity and familiarity of the Pietists all too superficial; and the repristination and regulation of the Doctrinalists all too narrow and regimented. The “Lits” cry out for worship that addresses the whole person, for worship that is historically conditioned and ecumenically sensitive. “Lits” believe that worship should restore the Lord’s Supper as part of the ordinary worship for the Lord’s Day. For all intents and purposes, “Lits” can be viewed as “Anglican Lite.” 10
Interestingly enough, according to the “Lits,” the solution to worship wars is formally similar to that given by the “Docs,” i.e., restore the Golden Age of Liturgy. However, they have a different project in mind and their Golden Age looks quite different from the models offered by the “Docs.” “Lits” are very much concerned with atmosphere, with ancient practices, symbols, rites, and ceremonies. “Lits” are big on observing the Christian Year and preaching through the Lectionary. They are quite happy with processions and robes, and many have
Reflections on Worship after Westminster (cont.)
embraced historic liturgies from the prayer books. And, yes, some have given way to chanting the Psalms. Not all “Lits” are convinced that the Westminster Assembly was a positive event. Less concerned about what is than what has been, the Liturgicalist is concerned with worship as Preservation.
We have now surveyed the four types of worship found in today’s Presbyterian Church. It is probably unlikely that the worship of any individual congregation looks exactly like any one of these types. Furthermore, it is also likely that most congregations are a mixture, with two or three types of worship co-existing in one, possibly confused, congregation. There is, I believe, a reason for this state of affairs. As noted by James F. White, there are nine Protestant worship traditions, at least four of which have had significant influence on Presbyterian worship: Anabaptist, Puritan, Reformed, and Anglican.11 All of these traditions have played a role in the shaping of Presbyterian worship, and the fact that we have four dominant worship types indicates the lingering influence they still exert.
While it is not possible to draw connections in every point, and while it is true that even among the four historical traditions there is overlap and interaction, it is possible to relate White’s historic worship traditions to the four worship types we have discussed. Broadly speaking, there are ties that link the “Pies” to the Anabaptist tradition; the “Docs” to the Puritan tradition; the “Kuyps” to the continental Reformed tradition; and the “Lits” to the Anglican tradition. In other words, Presbyterian worship has been influenced by at least four historical worship traditions, and it is quite possible that the four worship types we find today are linked in spirit, if not in fact, to these historic traditions.
My former colleague “Scoti” Old, now with the Lord, reminds us that the Reformed theologian must begin with the principle that “God created us to worship him. Surely it is here that we must begin when as Reformed theologians we ask what worship is. Worship must above all serve the glory of God.”12 But this ringing affirmation reminds us of a problem we jumped over earlier. We still need to acknowledge the 800-pound gorilla in our vestibule. Is it possible to find a sufficiently unified voice for Reformed worship, in light of our four Reformed worship types, to provide the irenic response that we seek?
I am not certain that such a voice is likely, but I believe it is possible. But in order to find that unified voice, there has to be a fundamental shift in attitude among the students of Reformed worship. Most importantly, we must begin to practice charity towards one another. This means at least two things. First, we must stop assuming that everyone who disagrees with us on some issue of Reformed worship does so out of disregard for the Reformed faith. For too long, too many have been too quick to believe that every divergent voice in the area of Reformed worship represents either ignorance of the Reformed faith or a failure to appreciate the Reformed tradition. Second, we must begin to recognize that the Reformed faith has never been monolithic.13 There were many perspectives in the mix that constituted sixteenth and seventeenth century Reformed belief and worship and many of those angles of vision are with us still.
If we are to find our unified voice, we will do so not by embracing one of the Reformed worship types to the exclusion of the others, but by identifying what is enduring and valuable in each of those four types. Each Reformed worship type offers important contributions that, together, can provide the full response needed for our postmodern, postChristian age. And, there is an underlying principle that must guide the entire discussion. As “Scoti” Old has stated it, “this then is the first characteristic of Reformed worship: it is worship that is ‘according to Scripture.’”14 With this principle as our guiding light, we may ask each of the four Reformed worship types, “What can you contribute to answering the challenges of our day?” “What is your unique offering that is ‘according to Scripture?’”
Reflections on Worship after Westminster (cont.)
In one sense, we have already anticipated this question with the concluding sentence in our discussion of each worship type. The Pietist is concerned with Inspiration, with worship that reaches the heart and stirs the soul and certainly heart-felt worship is in accord with Scripture. The Doctrinalist is concerned with Repristination, a somewhat misplaced emphasis that nonetheless signals a healthy interest in doctrinal faithfulness to Scripture and to the confessions of the Church. Certainly, this emphasis is “according to Scripture.”
The Kuyperian is concerned with Transformation, having an impact on the culture and, within bounds, making use of all legitimate cultural expressions in the worship of God. To the extent that such expressions are “according to Scripture,” the Kuyperian has something to offer. Finally, the Liturgicalist is concerned with Preservation, reminding us that Reformed worship is connected to the churches of the Reformation and their rich heritage of liturgies, prayers, and psalters. These, too, may very well be “according to Scripture.”
Perhaps, then, the unified voice that is lacking in Reformed worship might be provided not by a facile blending of concerns from these four worship types, but by a careful and thoughtful sifting of each type to determine what is “according to Scripture” and what needs to be discarded. This would not be an easy task, and not everyone would reach exactly the same conclusions. But such an exercise might lead us to realize that the four Reformed worship types have much more in common than we thought. Perhaps somewhere in the midst of these four types lies the best path forward and the unified voice we seek.
R. J. Gore Jr. (PhD, Westminster Theological Seminary) is Dean Emeritus and Professor of Systematic Theology at Erskine Seminary. He is the author of Getting Started: An Introduction to Theology for Students and Laymen and Covenantal Worship: Reconsidering the Puritan Regulative Principle.
1 Henry VIII ruled 1509-1547; Charles II ruled 1660-1685.
2 R. J. Gore Jr., Covenantal Worship (Phillipsburg: P&R, 2002), 4.
3 Chad Van Dixhoorn, Confessing the Faith (Carlisle: Banner of Truth, 2014), 276.
4 Ibid., 277.
5 Robert Letham, The Westminster Assembly, 301. Related issues, important but not the focus of this paper, would include those matters that by “good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture . . .” [WCF 1.6] and those troubling circumstances which are so easy to conceptualize in theory and often so difficult to handle in the concrete. For some helpful discussions on circumstances, See Edmund P. Clowney, “Distinctive Emphases in Presbyterian Church Polity,” in Pressing Toward the Mark ed. Charles G. Dennison (Philadelphia: Committee for the Historian of the OPC Church, 1986), 101-105; John M. Frame, “Some Questions About the Regulative Principle,” WTJ 54 (1992): 357-66; Douglas Kelly, “The Puritan Regulative Principle and Contemporary Worship,” in The Westminster Confession into the 21st Century (Fearn: Mentor, 2004), 76-82.
6 R. J. Gore Jr., Covenantal Worship, 18.
7 This threefold perspective has been addressed numerous times since the early 1980s. Historian George Marsden originally spoke of “doctrinalists, pietists and culturalists.” In 2010, the former pastor of Redeemer Church (NY), Tim Keller, addressed the PCA General Assembly on such party divisions within the PCA. Also, see Art Lindsley who references both Marsden and Keller in, “Knowing, Feeling, and Doing,” Institute for Faith, Works, and Economics. Sept 24, 2012. https://tifwe.org/resource/knowing-feeling-and-doing/. For this article, I will use the categories popularized by James B. Jordan in his “Pies, Docs, Kuyps, and Lits” in The Geneva Papers #6 (June 1982). 8 Roger Henderson, “Kuyper’s Inch,” Pro Rege 36:3 (March 2008): 12.
9 All references to Jordan are from the one-page article referenced in Footnote 7.
10 Hart makes a strong case for what we might call “Presbyterian Heavy” instead of “Anglican Lite” in his chapter, “Is High-Church Presbyterianism an Oxymoron,” in D. G. Hart, Recovering Mother Kirk (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2014), 21-40.
11 James F. White, Introduction to Christian Worship, revised edition (Nashville: Abingdon, 1990), 43.
12 Hughes Oliphant Old, Worship Reformed According to Scripture, Revised and Expanded Edition (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 2002), 2.
13 See the wide and incredibly rich offerings in Jonathan Gibson and Mark Earngey, Reformation Worship: Liturgies from the Past for the Present (Greensboro: New Growth Press, 2018).
14 Old, Worship Reformed According to Scripture, 3.
NEWS AT ERSKINE
FACULTY/STAFF NEWS
Rev. Dr. Kyle E. Sims named Director of Admissions and Church Relations
Dr. Kyle Sims (BA, ’93; DMin, ’10) has been appointed as Director of Seminary Admissions and Church Relations. He previously served as pastor of First Presbyterian Church (ARP) in Lancaster, SC, and as Chaplain of the Lancaster City Fire Department. Dr. Sims also served as Vice-Moderator of the ARP General Synod and is currently Principal Clerk. He and his wife, Kelly, have four children and live in Lancaster, SC.
Rev. Dr. Richard W. Winston named Associate Professor of New Testament
Dr. Richard Winston has been appointed as Associate Professor of New Testament and Director of the Doctor of Ministry program. He previously served as pastor of Roebuck Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Roebuck, SC. Dr. Winston is the author of Misunderstanding, Nationalism, or Legalism: Understanding Israel’s Chief Error with Reference to the Law in Romans 9:30—10:13. He and his wife, Bethany, live in Taylors, SC, with their two children.
Rev. Dr. Matthew S. Miller named Associate Professor of Pastoral and Historical Theology
Dr. Matthew Miller (ThM, ‘15; DMin ‘20) has been appointed as Associate Professor of Pastoral & Historical Theology and Director of the Master of Theology program. He has more than a dozen years of pastoral experience in ARP and PCA churches. Dr. Miller has translated two works by Reformed theologian Pierre Courthial from French into English and has been published in TableTalk, Reformed Faith & Practice, and Reformation21. Additionally, he serves as the City Director of the C.S. Lewis Institute in Greenville, SC. He and his wife, Lindsay, live in Greenville, SC, with their three children.
Dr. R. J. Gore Jr. publishes new book
Dr. R. J. Gore Jr. (DMin, ‘09) recently published Getting Started: An Introduction to Theology for Students and Laymen. He is Dean Emeritus and continues to serve as Professor of Systematic Theology. Dr. Gore is also the author of Covenantal Worship: Reconsidering the Puritan Regulative Principle. He and his wife, Joan, live in Due West, SC, and have three adult children and one grandchild.
ALUMNI/STUDENT NEWS
Rev. Darius James (MDiv, ‘20) serves as Director of Family Life & Outreach at Greenwood Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in Greenwood, SC. He also serves as a Lieutenant Colonel in the USMC Reserve. Originally ordained in the Church of God, he previously served as a Hospice Chaplain. He is currently pursuing a Doctor of Ministry degree at Erskine Seminary. Rev. James and his wife, Alicia (pictured here), have two children and live in Due West, SC.
Rev. G. Mark James is currently pursuing a Master of Theology (ThM) degree at Erskine Seminary. He serves as an Instructional Designer and Canvas Administrator for RTS – Global, as Stated Clerk of First Presbytery (ARP), and is an ordained minister with six years of pastoral experience. At a recent Southeast Regional Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, he was awarded a cash prize and books (see photo) for his student paper submission entitled “The Ethics of Affliction in Psalm 22.” Rev. James and his wife, Jacqueline, live with their four children in Stanfield, NC.
Dr. Steve Silvey (MDiv, ‘95) is the lead pastor of Covenant Baptist Church in Anderson, SC where he has served for over 25 years. He and his wife, Kim, have two children and live in Anderson, SC.
GLOBAL DIPLOMA
IN THEOLOGY AND CHRISTIAN LEADERSHIP ANNOUNCING A NEW GLOBAL MINISTRY PARTNERSHIP AND THE JOHN & SARAH ELLEN CARSON SCHOLARSHIP & GLOBAL THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION INITIATIVE
Will you celebrate and partner with us?
All funds will be used to provide education for Global South pastors and future Church leaders. Donations can be made at https://www.erskine.edu/giving/global-education/
LEARN MORE
If you have questions about any of our programs, connect with our admissions department
864-379-6571
etsadmissions@erskine.edu
We offer courses toward all degree programs at our locations in Due West, Columbia, and Greenville, SC, and online through Erskine Online.
CONNECT WITH US ONLINE
erskine.seminary @ErskineSeminary seminary.erskine.edu