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The Origins of Puritanism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Leonard J. Trinterud
Affiliation:
McCormick Theological Seminary

Extract

It has been the peculiar lot of Puritanism that, while most men will agree that its influence—good or evil—upon Anglo-Saxon culture and history has been profound, yet great disagreement exists as to just what Puritanism was, how it began, and what aspects of traditional Anglo-Saxon thought and life are traceable to Puritanism. The most common view is that Puritanism was imported into England from Calvinistic Geneva by the returning Marian exiles. This view must then go on to account for the many non-Calvinistic elements in the Puritanism of the Civil War era. Another school of thought has sought to identify Puritanism with the beginnings of democratic political, social and economic ideals during the Tudor-Stuart era. Almost diametrically opposed to this is yet another school of thought which finds in Puritanism an ultra-rightist authoritarianism in theology and politics, and the seed-bed of an unbridled and Pharisaical capitalism. Still others see in Puritanism the long hard travail which gave birth to the ideal of complete freedom for the individual in all phases of life. Of necessity, each of these interpretations, and others not here mentioned, has sought to ground itself in the history of the English Reformation, and so we have many quite different accounts of the origins and history of Puritanism.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1951

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References

1 Tyndale, Wm., New Testament, 1534Google Scholar, “To the Reader”, Pentateuch, 2nd ed., 1534Google Scholar, preface to Genesis, p. 28; Exposition of V, VI, VII chs. Matthew, in Works, Parker Society ed., pp. 470f.Google Scholar

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5 Op cit., III, pp. 283, 326, et passim.

6 Op. cit., I pp. 199ff, 273, 369ff.

7 Figgis, J. N., Studies of Political Thought from Gerson to Grotius, 1916, p. 71Google Scholar. According to L. Ranke, Melanchthon held the state-contract theory as early as 1523, Gierke, O., Development of Political Theory …, 1939, p. 115, n. 16.Google Scholar

8 By “Augustinian theology” here is meant not the theology of Augustine, himself, as such. The terms “Lutheran,” and “Calvinistic” do not necessarily mean precisely the views of Luther and Calvin. “Augustinian theology” is used here of that theology which in the late Medieval Era intended to represent the tradition and heritage of Augustine, but which had made its own selection, adaptation, and interpretation of Augustine. In this theology the basic problem was that of the ability of man to love God. Love was understood in an essentially mystical sense. The solution of the problem was found in, the late medieval form of the Augustinian synthesis, according to whieh reason was supplemented by revelation, and nature was completed by grace. Man's outgoing love to God had its roots in man's nature (mysticism, reason, nature), but could reach its object only when God gave—solely to those whom he had predestinated—that supplementing, completing aid (revelation, grace) without which man's efforts truly to love God were always defeated by the flesh— i. e. lust, pride, etc. Cf. Nygren, A., Agape and Eros, 2 Vols., 1932, 1938Google Scholar. Whereas in the Roman Church the adherents of this Augustinian tradition asserted that this supplementing aid, or grace, came through the sacramental-penitential means of grace, the Protestant adaptation of this Augustinianism asserted that it was by an inward change, a conversion of the heart, that man was enabled to love God.

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10 Op. cit., I, pp. 32ff, 339ff.

11 Op. cit., III, pp. 294f.

12 Oecolampadius, J., In Jesaiam …, 1525, p. 150.Google Scholar

13 Schrenk, G., Gottesreich und Bund im alter Protestant …, 1923, pp. 37ffGoogle Scholar. While this monograph is the most thorough history of the covenant theology yet written, it covers the period of origins much too hastily, and generalizes much too broadly. The Puritan phase is hardly noticed.

14 In Hoseam …, 1528, pp. 23b, 40, 150, et passim.Google Scholar

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24 A declaration of the ten holy comaundementes …, ed. 1550Google Scholar, preface. Cf. Lang, A., Puritanismus und Pietismus. Studien zu ihrer Entwicklung v. M. Butzer bis zum Methodismus. 1941, pp. 3850.Google Scholar

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27 It is common among covenant theologians to find at least the rudiments of their system in Calvin's writings, e.g., Sehrenk, , op. cit., pp. 36, 44ffGoogle Scholar; Doumergue, E., Jean Calvin, IV, 1910, pp. 202–4Google Scholar. Calvin indeed used the word “covenant” very frequently. He could not have written on Biblical topics without so doing. But, in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book II, chs. IX, X, XI, Book III, XVII: Book IV, chs. XIV, XV, XVI, XVII: and in his Commentary on Daniel, Eng. trans., vol. II, pp. 146fGoogle Scholar; and again in his two prefaces to the Geneva Bible of 1560, not to cite other passages, a meaning and interpretation are given to this term “covenant” which can in no manner be compatible with that meaning of “treaty,” “alliance,” “bargain,” “compact,” “conditional promise,” “mutual agreement,” “reciprocal agreement,” “confederacy,” “federation,” etc., which were essential to the Rhineland-Puritan covenant theology from its beginning in Oecolampadius, Zwingli, Bucer, et al., and in Tyndale, Frith, Bale, Hooper, et al., up until its final flowering in the later seventeenth century. The difference is that noted above. Perry Miller has also pointed out the great and essential difference between Calvin's theology and the Federal, or Covenant, theology in his two definitive studies of the later Puritanism, “The Marrow of Puritan Divinity,” Publications of the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, XXXII, pp. 247300Google Scholar, and, The New England Mind, 1939.Google Scholar

28 The attempt to trace the origins of the church covenant idea in English Puritanism to an Anabaptist source, as in Burrage, C., The Church Covenant Idea, 1904Google Scholar, fails to take account of the indisputable, widespread interest in both the Rhineland and England, in the social contract theory of the state, and in the covenant theology, prior to any possible influence from Anabaptist sources. Moreover, Burrage grants that the first clear, explicit use of the covenant notion in Anabaptist theology came in 1530, by Melchior Hofmann. Burrage believed that Hofmaim had gotten these initial covenant notions (regarding baptism and the covenant) from other Anabaptists in Strassburg, Ibid., pp. 19ff. Yet it was in Strassburg that Capito, Bucer, and others in the Rhineland cities had sponsored this idea apart from, and independent of, Anabaptist influences. Much more likely the Anabaptists in Strassburg got the idea from Capito (who was for a time very friendly to them) and from other Rhineland reformers through personal contact, or through books; or they also may have gotten at least elements of it from common late medieval notions. But, dependence of the English advocates of the church covenant idea upon Anabaptist sources cannot be maintained. Franklin H. Littell's forthcoming book on the Anabaptist doctrine of the Church (in press, American Society of Church History) should make some of these issues clearer.

29 This is shown plainly in the biographical sketches in Garrett, Christina's, The Marian Exiles, 1938Google Scholar. See also, Knappen, M. M., Tudor Puritanism, 1939, pp. 169ffGoogle Scholar; Hudson, W. S., op. cit., pp. 213f.Google Scholar

30 Blanke, F., “Zwinglis Prophezei und die Anfänge des Puritanismus” Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 1939, nr. 1175.Google Scholar

31 Lang, , op. cit., pp. 3235, 78.Google Scholar

32 The more important documents of this “Admonition” controversy were reissued with a useful introduction by Frere, W. H. and Douglas, C. E. as Puritan Manifestoes, 1907Google Scholar. A more recent, but less valuable treatment may be found in McGinn, D. J., The Admonition Controversy, 1949Google Scholar. See also Pearson, A. F. Scott's Thomas Cartwright, 1925Google Scholar, and his Church and State, Political Aspects of 16th Century Puritanism, 1928.Google Scholar

33 Calvin believed that the Scriptures taught, and the Early Church practiced, a form of church order in which all Christians were priests, and according to which there was only a difference of office, or function, between a minister and any other member of the Church. Office bearers in the Church came into office by election of the people, not by authority of other ministers, or bishops. The people then gave over actual government to the Church to their elected officers: pastors, teachers, elders, deacons. Through freely elected officers the Church thus controlled its own affairs. Yet, since the Lutheran Churches, the other Reformed Churches, and even the Church of England in Calvin's day, never explicitly formulated any sacerdotal doctrine of the ministry, and either explicitly or implicitly affirmed the universal priesthood of all believers, Calvin never contested the basic validity of those forms of government used by these churches. Cf. McNeill, John T., Unitive Protestantism, 1930Google Scholar; Ainslie, J. L., The Doctrines of Ministerial Order in the Reformed Churches of the 16th and 17th Centuries, 1940.Google Scholar

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37 Perry Miller's two works cited earlier gave a good indication of the almost unanimous acceptance of the covenant theology by the Puritans.

38 , R. W., and Carlyle, A. J., op cit.Google Scholar; Jas. Mackinnon, , History of Modern Liberty, 4 vols., 19061943Google Scholar; Figgis, , op. cit.Google Scholar; Gierke, , op. cit.Google Scholar

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42 The issues were, of course, highly complex, and much more involved than these paragraphs indicate. What is here intended, however, is merely to show that wherever one turns in an examination of the Puritanism of this period he finds the covenant-contract notion.

43 Pollard, A. W., and Redgrave, G. R., Short Title Catalogue of Books Printed …, 1475–1640, 1926Google Scholar; Donald, Wing, Short Title Catalogue … 1641–1700, 1945.Google Scholar

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45 On the continuity between Puritan preaching and medieval preaching, see, Broun, John, Puritan Preaching in England, 1900Google Scholar; Owst, G. R., Preaching in Medieval England, 1926Google Scholar, and Literature and Pulpit in Medieval England, 1933Google Scholar; Mitchell, W. F., English Pulpit Oratory …, 1932.Google Scholar

46 The best account of the genius of Puritan preaching is Wm. Haller's Rise of Puritanism, 1938.Google Scholar

47 The essentially English character of Puritanism is well demonstrated from two totally different approaches in Pauck, W., Das Reich Gottes auf Erden …, 1928, esp. pp. 147204Google Scholar; and Manning, B. L., The Peoples' Faith in the Time of Wyclif, 1919, esp. pp. 184188.Google Scholar

48 Minutes of the Sessions of the Westminster Assembly of Divines … (November 1644 to March 1649) ed. A. F. Mitchell and J. Struthers, 1874Google Scholar; Letters and Journals of Robert Baillie …, 3 vols., ed. D. Laing, 1842Google Scholar; Whole Works … John Lightfoot, ed. J. R. Pitman, 1824, vol. 13Google Scholar; Works … George, Gillespie, ed. W. M. Hetherington, 1846, vol. 2Google Scholar; Benj. Hanbury, Hist. Memorials … Independents or Congregationalists, 3 vols., 18411844Google Scholar; Shaw, W. A., Hist. English Church … 1640–1660, 2 vols., 1900Google Scholar; Warfield, B. B., Westminster Assembly …, 1931.Google Scholar

49 These problems, and their bearing upon the covenant-contract theory, are well set out in, Tracts on Liberty in the Puritan Revolution, 3 vols., ed. Wm. Haller, 1934Google Scholar; The Leveller Tracts, ed. Wm. Haller and G. Davies, 1944Google Scholar; Leveller Manifestoes …, ed. D. Wolfe, 1944Google Scholar; Pease, T. C., The Leveller Movement, 1916Google Scholar; Brown, L. F., Political Activities of the Baptists and Fifth Monarchy Men …, 1912Google Scholar; Gooch, G. P., English Democratic Ideas in the 17th Cent., 2nd ed. by H. J. Laski, 1927.Google Scholar

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51 The Congregationalists had, in 1658, adopted the Westminster Confession with but slight changes. This “Savoy Declaration,” or the unrevised original, was the common confession of British and American Congregationalists until into the 19th century. Walker, W., Creeds and Platforms of Congregationalism, 1893, p. 353Google Scholar. Certain Particular Baptists revised it for adoption in 1677.