BIBLIOGRAPHY.
Following the precedent of most of the Continental Reformed Confessions and the Irish Articles, the Westminster formulary properly begins with the Bible, on which all our theology must be based, and sets forth its divine inspiration, authority, and sufficiency as an infallible rule of faith and practice, in opposition both to Romanism, which elevates ecclesiastical tradition to the dignity of a joint rule of faith, and to Rationalism, which teaches the sufficiency of natural reason. It excludes the Jewish Apocrypha entirely from the Canon, while in the English and Irish Articles they are at least enumerated, though distinguished from the canonical books. [1467] The Confession gives to reason, or the light of nature, its proper place, distinguishes between the original Scripture and the translations, maintains the true exegetical principle of the self-interpretation of Scripture in the light of the Spirit that inspired it, and carefully avoids committing itself to any mechanical or magical or any other particular theory concerning the mode and degrees of inspiration, or obstructing the investigation of critical questions concerning the text and the authorship (as distinct from the canonicity) of the several books. [1468] It rests the authority of the Bible on its own intrinsic excellence and the internal testimony of the Spirit rather than the external testimony of the Church, however valuable this is as a continuous witness. [1469]
No other Protestant symbol has such a clear, judicious, concise, and exhaustive statement of this fundamental article of Protestantism. It has been pronounced equal in ability to the Tridentine decree on justification. [1470] It may more aptly be compared to the Tridentine decree on Scripture and tradition (Sess. IV.) and the recent Vatican decree on the dogmatic constitution of the Catholic faith (Sess. III.), as far as this relates to reason and revelation, and may be regarded as the best Protestant counterpart of the Roman Catholic doctrine of the rule of faith. The Confession plants itself exclusively on the Bible platform, without in the least depreciating the invaluable aid of human learning--patristic, scholastic, and modern --in its own proper place, as a means to an end and an aid in ascertaining the true sense of the mind of the Holy Spirit, who through his own inspired Word must alternately decide all questions of the Christian faith and duty. It is clear that Protestantism must sink or swim with this principle. Criticism, philosophy, and science may sweep away human traditions, confessions, creeds, and other outworks, but they can never destroy the fortress of God's Word, which liveth and abideth forever.
THEOLOGY AND CHRISTOLOGY.
Ch. II., 'Of the Trinity,' and Ch. XVIII., 'Of Christ the Mediator,' contain one of the best statements of the Nicene doctrine of the Trinity and of the Chalcedonian Christology, as held by all orthodox Churches. On these articles the evangelical Protestant Confessions are entirely agreed.
PREDESTINATION.
Ch. III., 'Of God's Eternal Decree,' [1471] Ch. V., 'Of Providence,' Ch. IX., 'Of Free Will,' and Ch. XVIII., 'Of the Perseverance of the Saints,' are closely connected. They present a logical chain of ideas which make up what is technically called 'the Calvinistic system,' as developed first by Calvin himself against Romanism, then in Holland and England against Arminianism.
This system had at that time a powerful hold upon the serious religious minds in England and Scotland, including many leading Episcopal divines (not of the Laudian type) who otherwise had no sympathy with Puritanism, and ridiculed it with bitter sarcasm, like Dr. South. Even the authorized English version of the Bible (1611) has been charged by Arminians with a Calvinistic bias, while Calvinists have never complained of any defect in this respect. [1472] The only question in the Assembly was as to the logical extent to which they should carry the doctrine of predestination in a confessional statement. The more consistent and rigorous scheme of supralapsarianism had its advocates in Westminster as well as in Dort, and was favored by Dr. Twisse, the Prolocutor, who followed Beza and Gomarus to the giddy abyss of including the fall itself in the absolute eternal decree as a necessary means for the manifestation of God's justice; but the infralapsarian (or sublapsarian) scheme of Augustine decidedly triumphed. Supralapsarianism has always remained only a private speculation.
The Westminster Confession goes, indeed, beyond the two Helvetic Confessions, the Heidelberg Catechism, the Scotch Confession, and the Thirty-nine Articles; but it goes not a whit further than the Canons of Dort (which had the approval of the delegates of King James), the Lambeth Articles, and the Irish Articles. [1473] It teaches really no more on predestination than the great Catholic Augustine had taught in the fourth century, as well as two archbishops of Canterbury--Anselm in the eleventh, and Bradwardine in the fourteenth century. [1474] It gives, however, a clearer logical shape and greater prominence to the doctrine in the system by placing it among the first articles. It puts the fall with its sinful consequences only under a permissive (as distinct from a causal or effective) decree, and emphatically exempts God from all authorship of sin. [1475] It does not teach the horrible and blasphemous doctrine (so often unjustly and unscrupulously charged upon Calvinism) that God from eternity foreordained men for sin and damnation; but it does teach that out of the fallen mass of corruption God elected a definite number of men to salvation and 'passed by' the rest, leaving them to the just punishment of their sins.
This is severe and harsh enough, but very different from a decree of eternal reprobation, which term nowhere occurs in the Confession. The difference is made more clear from the debates in the 'Minutes.' Several prominent members, as Calamy, Arrowsmith, Vines, Seaman, who took part in the preparation of the doctrinal standards, sympathized with the hypothetical universalism of the Saumur school (Cameron and Amyrauld) and with the moderate position of Davenant and the English delegates to the Synod of Dort. They expressed this sympathy on the floor of the Assembly, as well as on other occasions. They believed in a special effective election and final perseverance of the elect (as a necessary means to a certain end), but they held at the same time that God sincerely intends to save all men; that Christ intended to die, and actually died, for all men; and that the difference is not in the intention and offer on the part of God, but in the acceptance and appropriation on the part of men. [1476]
Another important and modifying feature is that the Confession, far from teaching fatalism or necessitarianism, expressly recognizes the freedom of will, and embraces in the divine decrees 'the liberty or contingency of second causes' (Ch. III., 1). [1477] Herein it agrees with Ussher, Bullinger, and Calvin himself, and favorably differs from the Lutheran Formula of Concord, which (following the strong expressions of Luther and Flacius) unphilosophically represents the human will before conversion to be as passive as a dead log or stone. The Confession makes no attempt to solve the apparent contradiction between divine sovereignty and human freedom, but it at least recognizes both sides of the problem, and gives a basis for the assertion that God's absolute decrees have no causal effect upon the sinful actions of men, for which they alone are responsible.
With the Calvinistic particularism the limitation of redemption [1478] is closely connected. The difference is chiefly one of logical consistency. It refers to the efficiency of redemption or its actual application. All were agreed as to its absolute sufficiency or its infinite intrinsic value. All could subscribe the formula that Christ died sufficienter pro omnibus, efficaciter pro electis. Dr. Reynolds, who seems to have defended the more rigorous view, said in the debate: 'The Synod intended no more than to declare the sufficiency of the death of Christ; it is pretium in se, of sufficient value to all--nay, ten thousand worlds.' [1479]
Nevertheless, behind the logical question is the far more important theological and practical question concerning the extent of the divine intention or purpose, viz., whether this is to be measured by God's love and the intrinsic value of Christ's merits, or by the actual result. On this question there was a difference of opinion among the divines, as the 'Minutes' show, and this difference seems to have been left open by the framers of the Confession. On the one hand, the closing sentences of Ch. III. 6 ('neither are any other redeemed by Christ, effectually called, justified, adopted, sanctified, and saved, but the elect only'), and Ch. VIII. 8 ('To all those for whom Christ hath purchased redemption, he doth certainly and effectually apply and communicate the same'), favor a limited redemption, unless the word redeemed be understood in a narrower sense, so as to be equivalent to saved, and to imply the subjective application or actual execution. [1480] On the other hand, Ch. VII. 3 teaches that under the covenant of grace the Lord 'freely offereth unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ, requiring of them faith in him, that they may be saved; and promising to give unto all those that are ordained unto life his Holy Spirit, to make them willing and able to believe.' This looks like a compromise between conditional universalism taught in the first clause, and particular election taught in the second. This is in substance the theory of the school of Saumur, which was first broached by a Scotch divine, Cameron (d.1625), and more fully developed by his pupil Amyrault, between A.D. 1630 and 1650, and which was afterwards condemned in the Helvetic Consensus Formula (1675). [1481]