Jim

Rowland S. Ward
Melbourne, Australia

I wholeheartedly agree that the Baptists cannot be justly charged with misology. But they changed the wording in 1:6 for some reason. It’s possible that they were cautious about the use of logic and sanctified reasoning. Any thoughts on the reason for the change?

Jim

I question whether there’s a significant semantic difference between the phrase “or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced” and the more concise “or necessarily contained.” The adverb “necessarily” is certainly related to logical necessity or deduction. For example, Merriam-Webster defines “necessarily” as a logical result or consequence (see most other English dictionaries). So the Baptists did allow for logical inference and were not, as some have charged, advocates of irrationalism.

Bob G.

1. Somehow several typos slipped into the table when my paper was edited for posting. These were not present in my original draft. Corrections have been made.

2. My comments in the main text are for the accepted reading of the WCF. My comments in the footnote pertain, as stated in the footnote, to the incorrect reading of the WCF, which states: “God alone is Lord of the conscience, and hath left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men, which are, in anything, contrary to his Word, or beside it, in matters of faith or worship.” The difference between this reading and the accepted one is underlined. See the expanded footnote.

3. I think that you have put your finger on some imprecision on my part. It’s a mistake to give the impression, as I have come dangerously close to doing, that the Congregationalists and Baptists took an “RPW-applies-to-all-of-life” position. They most certainly did not. It would be far more accurate to say that the confessions are somewhat ambiguous and inconsistent with respect to their statements in the chapter on Christian Liberty (20:2 in WCF and 21:2 in SD and 2LBCF) and their statements elsewhere concerning the Regulative Principle (1:6 in WCF, SD, and 2LBCF; 21:1 in WCF and 22:1 in SD and 2LCF). I have amended the text accordingly.

The ambiguity and inconsistency that I’m referring to is easier to see in the SD and 2LBCF. In these confessions the liberty of Christians is identical in the realms of worship and life. The RPW elsewhere articulated in these confessions doesn’t allow for this. In the WCF, this ambiguity and inconsistency is a little more difficult to see, but present nonetheless. In 1:6 the “nothing-is-to-be-added” principle applies to both faith and life. The statement in WCF 20:2 doesn’t square with this.

So what is the point in all this? We have four confessions (WCF accepted, WCF incorrect, SD, and 2LBCF) with three different views of how Scripture applies to worship on the one hand, and life on the other. These differences are neither accidental nor insignificant. Their implications for the RPW are inescapable and as significant as the differences themselves.

4. I have revised the footnote on Frame. The only point I wish to make here is that he isn’t necessarily wrong when he takes issue with the distinction made by “the eloquent semicolon” in WCF 20:2. Whether he realizes it or not, he is simply aligning himself more with the position articulated in SD and 2LBCF 21:2. His is not an “off-the-wall” position unless one is prepared to say the same for that of the Congregationalists and the Baptists.

5. You are correct in pointing out that ‘inference’ in the final paragraph of this section should be ‘consequence’. I agree that the elimination of good and necessary consequence from the 2LBCF seems to argue for the Baptists’ aversion to the use of logic or reason in doctrinal matters. (Personally, I believe that good and necessary consequence is a valid, important, and necessary principle. On this point I do not hesitate to agree with the WCF.) Your observation about the Baptists’ use of hymns, however, doesn’t necessarily follow from this. I am concerned that eliminating good and necessary consequence (thus limiting one’s options to explicit commands, biblically sanctioned examples, and “what is necessarily contained in Scripture,” whatever that means), might possibly shut one up to a more rigid application of the RPW. Fewer options usually mean less flexibility. (As you may know, some Baptists have argued for disciple baptism by immersion using the RP, as they understand it. Discounting good and necessary consequence makes it easier for them to do this.) I present this idea in the form of a question to consider, not an indisputable fact. I suggest it only as a possibility. A seeming example to the contrary in one area doesn’t negate the possibility of it in others. I offer this suggestion as a warning against uncharitable intolerance of others. Baptists may need to think about this.

I hope these clarifications are helpful. I sincerely thank you, Sean, for your valued input. Please greet Laura for me.

Gratefully,
Jim Domm

Since most of your article is merely an historical overview of the regulative principle, with particular application to Reformed Baptists, I will confine my response to the last part of it, concerning the perceived difference of the Westminster Confession on one hand, and the Savoy Declaration and Second London Baptist Confession on the other.

1. In your table, neither “set” of confessional declarations is rendered entirely correctly. Westminster states, “from the doctrines and commandments (of) men;” Savoy and the Second Baptist state, “from the doctrines (and commandments) of men.” I do not suppose this was purposeful; I only state the correct renderings to ensure we know of what we speak.

2. The main text of your article is contradicted by your note on the same text. Your main text reads: “The accepted reading of the Westminster Confession distinguishes the liberty that Christians have generally in life from that which they have in matters of faith and worship. In life they are free from the doctrines and commandments of men that are contrary to the Word of God. In matters of faith and worship, however, they enjoy an additional liberty. In these matters they are also free from the doctrines and commandments of men that are beside the Word of God.” Your note on this very text, however, reads, “The incorrect reading of the Westminster Confession only addresses the liberty that Christians have in matters of faith and worship. In this realm they are free from the doctrines and commandments of men that are contrary to the Word or beside it. Nothing is explicitly said about the liberty of Christians in life in general.” In the first, you say that the Confession states the liberty of the conscience of believers in all of life; in the second you say that it says nothing about their liberty in all of life. I would simply ask, Which is it? Unless you are in the note referring solely to the “all of life” aspect; but this was not clear at all from what you said.

3. I do not believe that your interpretation of these sections from the respective confessional documents is in harmony with the rest of those very sections. All of these documents continue, “So that, to believe such doctrines, or to obey such commands, out of conscience, is to betray true liberty of conscience: and the requiring of an implicit faith, and an (the Baptist Confession does not have the word “an” here) absolute and blind obedience is to destroy liberty of conscience, and reason also.”

It does not appear that the focus of these documents is to explain how Scripture applies to all of life, in view of some concept of “all of life” worship; or to determine whether the regulative principle of worship applies to all of life, as it does to more formal worship settings. Rather, the section revolves around the imposition of man-made doctrines or commandments (as the Papists did), or the imposition of man-made worship (as the Prelatists did), for conscience’s sake. Westminster rightly condemned such impositions as contrary to true liberty of conscience. But the Presbyterians still employed a Directory for Worship (more like a rubric or a guideline than a liturgy), so as to have all the churches observe only God’s ordinances God’s way, but also so that the churches would observe the same order and form. Notice that there is nothing in that section of Westminster condemning the use of a Directory or Form mandating the observance of divine ordinances, but the Directory itself not explicitly commanded in the Word of God.

It would appear that the Independents and Baptists were opposed even to this measure, and so phrased their statement thus: “God alone is Lord of the conscience, and hath left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are in any thing contrary to his word, or not contained in it.” Not only can the Papists not impose doctrines or commandments of men; not only can the Prelatists not impose ordinances and ceremonies of men; but even the Presbyterians cannot impose (by way of presbytery, synod, general assembly, etc.) a form or directory for worship not found in the Word itself.

In other words, these sections of our respective Confessions of Faith still speak to us today, but not in the way you are indicating. These documents arose within a particular historical context, dealing with particular theological and practical questions concerning the liberty of conscience. The relatively recent question of how the regulative principle applies to “all of life” worship was not on the table at that time.

4. Your footnote on John Frame, claiming that he is simply espousing the position of the Savoy Declaration and the Second London Baptist Confession, is therefore moot, since none of the Reformed confessional documents (these included) apply the regulative principle to all of life. Moreover, his attempts to ignore the confessional position on the regulative principle regarding “parts of the ordinary religious worship of God” (WCF 21.5) and “circumstances concerning the worship of God” (WCF 1.6), instead using his own “norms” and “applications” of worship, abandons not only Westminster, but Savoy and the Baptist Confession as well.

5. The phrase in Westminster (and Savoy) is not “good and necessary inference,” but “good and necessary consequence” (1.6); that is, whatever may be logically and of necessity deduced or concluded from the express words of Scripture, is just as binding as the express words of Scripture — any true doctrine which is the result of the comparison of several texts of Scripture is a “good and necessary consequence;” any true application of the case of a believer described in Scripture to a believer living today is a “good and necessary consequence.” The avoidance of this phrase by the Baptists of 1677 seems rather to argue the refusal to admit of logic or reason in doctrinal matters, rather than to “shut them up to a more rigid, narrower understanding and application of the Regulative Principle.” Indeed, since the Baptists were the first Reformed churches to give confessional allowance to non-canonical hymns of human inspiration, I would argue that this phrase is not indicative of a stricter understanding of the regulative principle, in the slightest.

It was not my intention to go this long in a response; I did not seek to be adversarial, but respectfully corrective. Your article obviously took quite a bit of time and research, for which you ought to be commended. I wish you only the best, and that your Sabbath tomorrow be a blessed one, as you seek to worship our Saviour in spirit and in truth.

And as an aside, my wife Laura (formerly Doman) gives her regards.

In Christ,
Sean McDonald

I have revised the section on The Question of Uniformity.

I fully agree that it is never right for Christians to observe, adopt, or imitate pagan worship rites–not at home and not in public worship.

I’m not sure that I would categorically identify the celebration of Christmas privately at home as observing, adopting, or imitating pagan worship rites.

Thank you, Jason, for your helpful input. Iron sharpens iron.