I think it is going too far to say the Confession contradicts Messrs Shepard, Palmer and Cawdrey, or vice versa. There is no doubt that the divines conceived of the abiding obligation of the Sabbath in the same way as these writers. The Confession speaks of the Sabbath commandment as "positive, moral, and perpetual." In defending the perpetuity of the Sabbath, S, and P & C are showing how the Sabbath is both positive and moral; they are not stepping outside of the boundaries of confessional or standard Puritan thought.

Mr. Foulner makes a point which needs further discussion:

The Sabbath is based on both positive and moral obligation, as WCF 21:7 states. In eternity, the whole time will be set apart to the worship of God, not a specific portion of time. Eternity itself will be a Sabbath. Hence a "set time" cannot be an eternal unchanging law of God. The positive precept is established on the moral foundation that "a due proportion of time be set apart for the worship of God."

It is the interplay of positive and moral law in Puritan thought which this discussion is not really grasping. A specific action might be moral without being eternal and unchanging for the simple reason that it is based on something eternal and unchanging.

__________________
Yours sincerely,


"Illum oportet crescere me autem minui."

What I wrote was: ...others had suggested the idea that Question 98 of the Westminster Larger Catechism refutes my point by stating that the moral law is summarily comprehended" in the Decalogue; i.e. that the Decalogue is an incomplete summary of the entire moral law given exhaustively in the civil stipulations. But one reason their view is untenable is that “summarily” means giving the essentials and “comprehended” is from the Latin ‘comprehendere’, which, in this context means either "understood" or "included" as in "education comprehends the training of many kinds of ability” (a meaning well known to the Divines, whose University education had been conducted in Latin.) (Cf. the New Lexicon Webster's Dictionary of the English Language, 1989. s. v. "comprehend"). Thus, for the Divines, anything not "comprehended" in the Decalogue was not understood or included within the essential moral will of God."


According to your earlier post, Shepherd says the decalogue the judicials. This is not the same as saying that "the moral law is summarily comprehended in the decalogue." Summarily comprehended is not virtually comprehended. Is Shepherd saying that the all the points of the judicials appear in principle in the decalogue?

snip....

No but the Confession did define them and, as I keep saying, the Confession trumps all. Given that the divines define the moral law as the decalogue, the ceremonial laws as the typical ordinances prefiguring Christ, the only remaining type of law needing to be defined is the "sundry judicial laws" given to Israel as "a body politic."

It is one thing to assert this point. It is another thing entirely to prove that even if various learned men did use the term in this sense, they meant it in that sense in the Confession when the words they used clearly define the term another way.

5. When Rutherford says it is not a judicial law he is meaning that it is part of the Moral law. he is not inventing a new category altogether. Just what is a law binding perpetually on gentiles now and then if it is not the moral law? [/quote]

It is one of the laws that Rutherford believed were binding because "the general equity therof" so required.

Given that Bahnsen's view is that any Jewish stipulation is binding unless altered either explicitly or implictly amended, Rutherford's comment applies to Bahnsen as well. And I have yet to see Bahnsen admit to any civil stipulation being altered in the NT (aside from the mode of execution in capital cases, which does not affect the equity of the punishements and hence does not properly contradict his principle.)

So I ask why do you not do the same with the Westminster Confession on the moral and judicial laws? They are defining the concept confessionally which may be different from how some of them defined it earlier. Keep in mind that the confession is likely a compromise at this point.

Which appears to be what you are doing when you set the other writings of some Divines against the confession.

That the divines never debated Klineans or other moderns does not mean that they did not come up with a compromise to set a big tent enveloping many positions. That is what they did. Which is why we cannot presume that what a Divine says elsewhere controls the meaning we assign to the terms of the Confession. Instead we must accept the terms mean what the confession defines them to mean.

If you really believe that because a man subscibes to something it is impossible that he does not misunderstand what he is subscribing to, I ask how did the Tractarians come into being?

But the confession does not say that. The confession says the "sundry judicial laws ... have expired and [no] longer oblige any other now further than general equity may require." I agree that when a law remains valid today the reason it remains so is that it is binding in its general equity and not tied to temporary geographical, social or covenantal settings.

I don't have access to the OED right now although I usually do. When I checked it, I found that it "confirmed" the usage I cited from Websters. And that that meaning was the best fit in the context of WLC 98.

One comment. Followers of Bahnsen may choose to reject the perspective I outline here. But Martin is the first Theonomist I have encountered in 7 years of discussion, who has seriously tried to engage it.

Blessings

__________________
In Christ's love and service

Mr. Tim Cunningham, Dip. CS (Regent College)
Member, First Baptist Church
Vancouver, BC

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"The Reformation was a time when men went blind, staggering drunk because they had discovered, in the dusty basement of late medievalism, a whole cellar of 1500-year-old, 200 proof grace—a bottle after bottle of pure distillate of Scripture, one sip of which would convince anyone that God saves us single-handedly. The word of the gospel—after all these centuries of trying to lift yourself into heaven by worrying about the perfection of your own bootstraps—suddenly turned out to be a flat announcement that the saved were home-free before they started. Grace was to be drunk neat: no water, no ice, and certainly no ginger ale." – Robert Farrar Capon

At the moment you are begging how the confession defines the Moral law.


You are exactly right. What you don't realize is that any attempt to confessionally define the judicials as part of the moral law, would have run afoul of many of the Divines, which is the other reason your attempt to do so is untenable.

Actually they would tell the Theonomists to read the confession more carefully.

I am not saying that the Confession contradicts Messrs SP&C at all points. But I do say that the Confession clearly defines the "moral law" in a way different from the way C&P approached the matter.

I think, on closer inspection, it will be seen that the "way different" is merely an equivocation on the word "moral" and that the Confession makes use of this equivocation as readily as do S, P & C. Moral might mean, as per Mr. Foulner's definition, the eternal unchanging will of God. Or it might mean, as per your Anthony Burgess reference, universally binding. It might also mean, grounded upon the moral law. The semantic range of terms needs to be clearly defined before one can start pitting authors from the same tradition against each other.

I agree that the discussion is complicated by equivocation over the meaning of "moral law" Yet the WCF specifically defines "moral law" as the decalogue instead of putting forward a relatively undefined reference to the "eternal unchanging will of God." So I don't think the Confession can be fairly charged with equivocating over the meaning they assigned to [the] "moral law." Is there somewhere where the Confession itself uses the moral law to mean something other than the decalogue?

No, the Confession states the moral law was delivered by God in ten commandments upon Mt. Sinai (19:2) and clearly differentiates ceremonial and judicial laws from the moral law (19:3, 4). But this obscures somewhat the point I was making. I was attempting to look at the idea of morality and binding obligation in general, as it is presented in the fourth commandment (WCF 21:7). The statement about the Sabbath being positive, moral, and perpetual shows that binding obligation is not confined to the narrow use of the word "moral," but includes positive institutions.

We appear to be talking at cross purposes. As far as the Theonomy debate is concerned, the clear distinction the Confession draws between the eternal moral law and the expired judicials which may only oblige now if their general equity requires is of utmost importance for developing a biblical hermenetic for applying the civil laws today.

The "positive moral and perpetual commandment" of God's word that instituted the binding obligation of the sabbath is the fourth commandment of the decalogue which is the moral law of 19:1-3. And it applies today because the moral law doth forever bind all. (The day being changed by order of the Lawgiver as we see in the NT).

Given the above, I don't think that we can automatically apply the "the idea of morality and binding obligation in general, as it is presented in the fourth commandment (WCF 21:7)" to establish a general principle "that binding obligation is not confined to the narrow use of the word "moral," but includes positive institutions" when the Divines used it only to establish the continuity of one institution which is a part of the eternal "moral law" which binds all.

We may not read the divines' use of the term moral in 22:7 back into 19:4 in such a way as to alter their definition of the term "moral law" at that place. The statement of the Sabbath law cannot be read to infer anything contrary to 19:4 without accusing the divines of self contradiction.

The cross purposes may arise because I'm not looking at theonomy per se, having already noted its differences with the Confession. I'm looking at the way certain Puritan divines are being pitted against the Confession, when it seems to me the Confession uses the word "moral" in one sense, whereas these divines use it in another sense. It appears to me that the Confession doesn't always use the word "moral" in the same sense, which is why I referred to WCF 21:7.

Here I see you are using the word "moral" for eternal moral law. That undoubtedly is one sense; but it is clear that the Sabbath is more than moral. Hence those Puritan divines were concerned to show how it is "morally binding" even though it is not entirely "moral" per se. Do you see what I am driving at? The language of the Confession at chap. 21 and these Puritan divines needs to be understood in the context of the debate and use of terminology as it had come to be defined in the Sabbath controversy. OTOH, the language of the Confession at chap. 19 needs to be understood in the context of the terminology used in the Antinomian controversy.

Something important is being missed here. The fourth commandment of the "moral law" -- the Sabbath -- is partly moral and partly positive. This is clear from 21:7. There is a subset of moral obligation that is not moral but positive in Puritan thought. It is this aspect of Puritan ethical thought which your critique is missing, and which enables you to read certain Puritan divines in tension with the Confession.

I am not familiar with the Sabbath controversy and do not know how the language of chap. 22 reflects that discussion. But my main point, with which you seem to agree, is that the language of ch. 19, even though it uses the same word "moral" of the law, is using the word in a different sense which the Divines took care to specifically define.

The only divines I see as being in possible tension with the Confession are Cawdrey and Palmer and the only point I see there being any possibility of tension is when C&P's view that many judicial laws were moral encounters the confession's refusal to so define the judicials. Neither C nor P were on the drafting committee that drafted 19:4 and they appear to have taken no part in the discussions on it either in committee or on the floor of the full Assembly.

The reason I don't think they were necessarily in tension is that, as both Martin and I have observed, 19:4 was designed to be inclusive of as many Calvinists as possible. It does not in itself settle the question of which judicials apply; instead, by stipulating that only those judicials whose general equity requires continue today, the Confession provides a method for determining which laws apply. If one can demonstrate general equity applies, then the stipulation remains valid.

I that Cawdrey and Palmer and any others of their ilk, although disagreeing with some divines on the question of which laws still apply, would still have been satisfied with the confession's method of determining whether Mosaic judicials continue since they believed they could show that many judicial laws had general equity on their side.

This is the point I am examining. The Puritans categorise the judicials as positive law. The Confession categorises the Sabbath commandment as moral and positive. Hence there is no "tension" within Puritanism or the Confession as to the "morality" of positive laws like the judicials. We need not posit a tension where there isn't one. C&P would have been in full agreement with the Confession. The idea that the Confession was accommodating a variety of "Calvinist" views in its formulation of chap. 19 is without historical foundation.

no he is saying all the 'Moral Law' appears in principle in the decalogue. which is all I am getting at here. I don't think the decalogue is an incomplete summary. But it is does summarize a larger thing which we call the Moral law. Every Moral command is "Honoured" by its summary in a way that other commands are not. But Shepard also says that the equity of the Judicials is not based on the applicability of the law to today but the immutability of the law it enforces. I think this maybe what accounts for the terminology of some of the Divines.

besides I've got my own smilie now so who cares what the Confession teaches!


could we start a thread to find the best paragraph just using smilies and one word conjunctions?

__________________
Martin Foulner
secondhand bookseller
Church of Scotland

Some Divines and some Puritans may categorize the Sabbath commnand as moral and positive either elswhere or within the confession and some Puritans and Divines may so characterize the judicials elsewhere. Yet, whatever they may have privately thought, they specifically chose not to incorporate that characterization in the Confession, rather they laid out a different way of justifying the continuity of any judicial law.

Given that the Independents in general and Goodwin in particular were known to reject the automatic continuity of the judicial laws (Goodwin, Works 11:26) and that the divines differ over their lists of crimes where they think the Mosaic penalties apply, I think your claim that the Confession is not accomodating a variety of views in its formulation of chapter 19 does lack a historical foundation. Gillespie and Rutherford do not fully agree with Cawdrey and Palmer and none of these four men would agree with Goodwin on the extent of the applicable judicials today. So the Confession finessed that question and does not elucidate which stipulations continue; rather it provided a method, agreeable to all, to use in answering questions of which judicials apply.

The Confession hasn't provided anything unique. Its statement is standard Puritan formulation, as will be seen by consulting the works of Perkins and Ames as well as the generality of Puritan divines. If it could be shown that the Confession stated something new, then a via media position would be a tenable hypothesis. But as there is nothing new here, the idea is a fiction. And again, Messrs. Cawdrey, Palmer and Shepard were not saying anything new, as will be seen by consulting the various publications associated with the Sabbath controversy. All of the Puritans were bound to prove how something partially positive was perpetually binding or "moral" in the broader sense of that term.

I agree that the WCF follows standard Puritan formulations and is not unique. I have seen Perkins and Usher's Irish Articles on the point. All I am saying is that the Divines did not bring the question of whether or not positive laws were binding into the chapter that set out the confessional understanding of which laws continued.

I would suggest this sermon: SermonAudio.com - The Judicial Law, Part 5

__________________
Richard
CofE
UK