17th-century French Reformed church polity (KIRS) — transcript

Lecture · 10th Reformation Memorial Academic Seminar, KIRS · Dr Paul Wells, emeritus professor, Faculté Jean Calvin, Aix-en-Provence · 17 January 2020

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On this site : 17th-century French Reformed church polity (KIRS) — Dr Paul Wells, Aix-en-Provence

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to be here this afternoon and to spend this time with you but the sense in century in France begins with the exception of Henry of Navarre to the throne when he converted to Catholicism and 1589 this events ended the bloody wars of religion and it ended up as well with relative tolerance for the Protestants for the French Huguenots with the Edict of Nantes in 1598 and the Edict of Nantes existed in France to give a period of toleration for Protestants until Louis XIV revoke this laser in 1685 during the 17th century

Protestants in France had restricted but real liberties and growing civil oppression the relative tolerance provided the necessary conditions for establishments of church governments and the growth of the Reformed churches in France during this period they were certain two royal authority in such a way that the king the French King avoided active opposition against them which occasioned the Catholic dictum of the time soomi common ooga no meaning submissive like a Huguenot first of all before speaking about French

governments will say a few words about the tragic face of Protestantism during this period this period was a critical time for the French reforms one from which the church in France never really recovered in spite of the limited toleration of the Edict of Nantes from that point onwards it was a case of progressive strangulation of the Reformed Church in France it's estimated that by the time of the revocation so in 1589 not only tens of thousands of Huguenots had left france by emigration but also six hundred pastors

others recants it publicly really also officially in the following century preached free thinking of the Enlightenment did its work on the remnants and the result was that just before the French Revolution in 1789 there were only four hundred and seventy two churches left in France by comparison with twelve hundred churches in 1570 just after Calvin's death with diminished congregations in restrictive Protestant enclaves and only 180 masters were left so this time was a time of increasing difficulty for churches will

move on to the second point sanam nickel and church controversies following the death of Nantes in 1598 cynics of the church met every three years regularly until 1628 and after that there were only forcing us because the king reduce the activity shelter in 1631 and 1644 alice' in 1637 and finally the last Senate of the French Reformed churches at Loudun in 1659 after 1659 there were no sin us before 1789 before the French Revolution the main process and figures of the period where the spark John Cameron Moïse Amyraut

Pierre du Moulin shall die yay Andre give a shout Srilanka well Paula Jean Claude and Pierre Jurieu these were French pastor theologians the influence of Geneva was important with the 13e particularly François Turrettini 1623 to 87 and Jean Diodati who translated the Bible into Italian Bénédict Pictet was also important to wrote the three volumes theology published at the end of this time in 1698 and an influential two volume were Christian ethics in 1692 the main issue of the time in the life of the sinners was the

condemnation arminianism and the fear on the part of certain pastors concerning Amyraldianism the teaching of Moïse Amyraut developed from the universalism of this Scot Cameron who taught in the Academy at Saumur du will now grow pointedly about the Arminians he called them Apes of the collegians I think a peer is not an animal was an imitator of the Galatians and his anatomy of Arminianism was published first in Latin in 1619 later in French and reveals his qualities as theologian and polemicist the opponents of Amyraut

feared that his soutane to state view of the decrying TV the divine decree of salvation was in fact something which were collapsed into our many impressive fashions and limit divine sovereignty in salvation they thought this Amyraldianism was planning a different furrow from the Synod of Dordt the Canons of Dordt had been accepted by the Synod of Alès with Pierre du Moulin as moderator in however the Thira theology tortoise samuel by Amyraut, Place and Cappel in the line of Cameron retained attractions throughout this

period and it was never formally can dammed by a sin out of the church is heresy unfortunately Amyraut was a great theologian and he's only generally recognized and remembered in this context another sin article controversy later surrounds the song of theology and the doctrine of the holy spirit and is related to the work one Claude Pajon and it concerns the work of the holy spirit on the intellect and the will in salvation these arguments over theological points in the French singer were very important and very often

occupied all the time when the cinahl's were meeting these polemics in the Synod Rugal down throughout the period and in a way weakened the unity of the process in church witness and took them away from the real political problem which was a double one the problem of renewed Roman Catholicism and its defenders and the authoritarianism the tyranny of the King on the other and an important question is this and I think this was a negative result of all the controversy about a morality anism in the sin out of the French

churches the French Protestants never developed a form of resistance other than passively to all the monarchy before the Camisard uprising in the same and in the following centuries there was no opposition as in Scotland against tyranny on the part of people like Rutherford in his –racks –racks –racks or louie are to Xia's in Holland in his political or the Puritan opposition against royal power in England the monarch Omax who had contested absolute power at the end of the sixteenth century were more or less forgotten

and also forgotten was the final section of Calvin's Institutes talking about the limitation of power and Beza's rights of the magistrates and their active ideas about opposition to tyranny were more or less left on one side and you might pose the question of whether the cenotes of the reformed church were not too much concerned about pleasing the king rather than about maintaining their liberties and that's an important question now we come to the main part of my talk this afternoon the origins point-three of the

Sonata call system it's been cited French church policy is vital for the development of Presbyterianism since it was adopted and adapted by all the other major reformed churches in Western Europe and Beyond and three factors went into making up this particularity what contributed to the few of the governments of the church in the French churches well first of all Calvin's view of governments not Church governments but civil governments secondly his view of the church and its order and thirdly the ecclesiastical discipline

that discipline Ecclesiastes adopted by the French churches along with the La Rochelle confession the Confessio Gallicana of 1559 this discipline was added to the 38 original articles of the confession and had increased to two hundred and fifty two articles by the Synod of Loudun in 1659 now in contrast to Martin Luther whose view of church organization was more circumstantial Calvin thought that the organization of the church has a double character first of all it immediately placed under the lordship of Christ not

under any human authority and there is a definite pattern of church government's prescribed in Scripture in the New Testament in this Calvin applied Luther's to Kingdom theology the rule of Christ in society in the church but with greater consistency than the German reformer on the level of civil governments our first points as the final chapter of the Institutes Calvin argues for public representatives to resist a Kings tyranny when necessary and here you have a famous quote from the last chapter of Calvin's Institutes

of the Christian religion chapter xx section 31 in which Calvin describes on the one hand a king and on the other hand the people and between the king and the people there are the representatives of the people who Calvin calls magistrates and Calvin says that if the magistrates of the people don't defend the cause of the people against tyranny and oppression of the King with the authority then they are being unfaithful and perfidious in their task so Calvin had a very definite idea of the limitation of royal authority

by an intermediary power the magistrates who represented the people now you have something comparable in the second point concerning the church governments and obviously there's no direct command ruler in the church as in the civil governments because Christ reigns directly as king of his people however under Christ as under the human king in a nation there are those who exercise authority the church is not communistic or anarchistic but it's order is a short by appointed officers who are like the magistrates in the

States Calvin believed that this view of church order was indicated by Scripture and in the primitive church before the abuses of the papacy and he recognized three offices that's a posture of elder or overseer and of dica in regard to the matter of whether one person or instance should appoint a minister for a particular church Calvin stated that to take away from the church or from the College of pastors the right of judging would profane the power of the church the Divine Right this is davina an elder or Deacon

is recognized by the qualifications of Scripture approved by the church this view is elaborated in article 29 of the La Rochelle confession that space weekly means that this true church be governed recordings of the order established by our Lord Jesus Christ that there should be pastors overseers and deacons so that true doctrine may have its course the question special offices implies us of hierarchy and organization particularly against the backdrop of the Roman pyramid structure of authority and its division of

society into clergy and laity it's often been stated as an elaborate system of hierarchies existed in the refreshed reformed system however if some form of hierarchical order exists the fundamental principle of the confession and the discipline following it is rather at sea higher and expressed in article 30 we believe the sort through postures wherever they may be have the same Authority and equal power under one head Jesus Christ and that consequently no church shall claim any authority all dominion over any other

article 31 continues by stating that no person may aspire to office in the church in and of himself but thus election is the means to aspire into responsibility in the church three affirmations are main in these articles firstly no minister occupies a position that is superior to another secondly no church or church institution as Authority or power over another and thirdly those serving the church must be elected because their calling is recognized as coming from the laws of the church each of these affirmations raises

the ANSI hierarchical principle to the level of status confess Yanis bernard roussel a french scholar States as article 1 of the discipline rejects all organizational hierarchy there are no offices or assemblies over each other and no higher and level or lower levels of authority other than that of the consistency over the congregation which is a biblical order in French this organizational structure is called Lu regime tres b0c Nadal the Presbyterian sinner though regime so accept the fact that there is a complementarity

between the principle of local diversity and collective you a delicate balance of power exists under the authority of Christ between the congregation and the general Church between the consistory and the Synod power exists first of all in the local congregation now let's go on a little further to describe this Presbyterian Sonata consistently the elaboration of the Sonata chol system at the end of the sixteenth century at the beginning of the 17th was special in France as Geneva itself had notes in up if the Geneva

model was followed to a certain points the French adaptiveness to the vast needs first growing needs of the church in a hostile nation first of all a grassroots level the discipline placed the governments of the local church in the council of elders called the consistory the church is congregationally governs but not in the sense of Congregationalism later in 1645 the Synod of Charenton and warned against Congregationalism of the independence arriving from England who did not recognize the authority of sinners the

local elders in the church number five to ten in each church and were elected by the community to oversee the preaching of the word and altering church life pastors were elected by the council of elders but later after 1571 they were also examined by the provincial Synod India years most of the French pastors were formed at the academy in Geneva and academies were later established in several different regions of France so there was the church the consistory there was the local synod's and then there was the general

synod of the church the sin of the several representatives of the churches pastors and laymen on the principle of delegation and that did assembly ordinance of liaison between the local churches with the aim of furthering the common interests of the churches the sin of a lector de president's later called the moderator whose duties according to Article two of the discipline were to be limited to the duration of the Synod and where to tip terminate that in send this was a measure of defense against a viscous be and

against the domination of powerful personalities the pastoral body which grew from to 800 by the middle of the 17th century was very often particularly in southern France composed of a strong representation of the intellectual lilies and during this period more a third of them were sons of crustless originally there were no permanent church commissions or standing agencies and in 1650 63 of Lyon France was divided into nine provinces and consistently consistory in each province were to elect delegates to the Synod

so within 20 years after the death of Calvin a system of organization and governments emerged in France that was not hierarchical but caramel characterized by a pyramid structure in the delegation of authority the local church delegated its authority to the council or the consist which delegated its authority in representatives of the provincial singer which delegated authority to the national group or General Synod which met every three years this system has be called democratic centralism it implies a centralized

collectivity existing in complimentary extension to the local instances of governments and the system of representation based on the election of delegates with equal representatives from the body of pastors and laymen and this system existed in the Senate's of the church as long as they mask for points cynical problems provincial Senate's and national sinners were caused to deal with some sorts of issue and very often these concerns Church governments and organization or on the other hand theological Alaric's a Baratheon

ISM and Arminianism that we've spoken about but we'll leave that on one side for this afternoon so let's consider the politics of church governments as they were developed in France in certain debates from the start there was a classic distinction between a please plant a church plants and a please dressing or churches standing up the difference was in the church plant there was only a pastor but no board of elders and in a church that was dressing or established there was the pastor and the vault of elders as early

as sixty-two the Synod of audience condemned it sucked by wall Jean Morély defending the idea that the entire congregation is called to elect its pastors and elders and to exercise discipline and this was rejected and a long rising by on Spanish on dia and by the decision of successive singers of the church and this became the position of the French Reformed Church ever since the Shanthi of following Calvin saw the reform consistory being on the pattern of the Sanhedrin and both exegesis in Matthew 1860 salads of the

church to mean the governing body thus the government of the church was rooted squirly in a standing Church an established church in the authority of the consistory or the council made up of elders and pastors from an early time in the history of the French churches even the much respected general Senate's of the church and legitimacy not in themselves but only as meetings of delegated representatives of the churches will move up a little further to see what the authority of sinners was in the local church the authority

laid with the pastor's of the delegated elders and they were the decisional body but the authority of sin arts in the second point was raised by the fact that the French church structure had to deal with two complementary authorities the authority relationship between the local consist seeing the congregation which was not the same as that between the Senate and the local consistory z– if a consistory of Board of Elders governs the local church it cannot be said that the sin of rules or governs the local consistory

z– the sin of derives its authority in an indirect way from the agreements of churches to be in union and on a federal principle under a common confession this point was much discussed in the French church Senate's and it was the object of the writing by the famous jurist Pierre Jurieu who toppled the problem in his work published in 1696 called the true system of the church church associa assembled some sentinels in which they made some rules and canons by the power of their Federation they voluntary submitted to

certain rules which they themselves made the right that these sinners have to censor and chastised those who break the order is founded upon the very well of those who are censored this recognises that although such institutions are not contrary to the will of God they insist by human policy consents and are not specifically instituted by them there is therefore recognize two facts here sinners cannot play involved in a relative Authority and can waver in their decisions and deliberations as such their actions are

not above scrutiny and criticism positively insofar as they are subjects of Scripture they can confess the faith of the churches as the bond of unity in witnesses truth and justly represent the will of the church secondly because they are human institutions they can never legislate new doctrines or practices in the way that the castle of the Roman Catholic Church might pretend so this has a double consequence now congregations are individuals that introduce new teaching or practice into the church fall under the sanctions

of Synod acting on behalf of all furthermore if a similar humanely one of its decisions it is legitimate that the local congregation judge that the federal principle has been broken and separated for reasons of faithfulness to Scripture this was an important point in the development of church life the relationship between the sinner which is a human institution and the local church is the power of the local church is always being in the consistence consistory now I'll move rapidly after the conclusion Reformed Church

governments in conclusion came to be modeled in examine an exemplary way in France in the 17th century the Presbyterian proposed with the church led by a council of elders places authority under Christ in the leadership of the local church this is close to the New Testament model for the local church as described in the acts and the epistles the unity of the church on the other hand is expressed in regular meetings of cinahl's although it may be doubted that the New Testament could itself justify anything more that

occasional punctual sin meetings rather than annual or regular assemblies this structure of the consistory xand cenotes has created the stability of reformed churches regular ministry and the exercise of discipline in practice that we will conclude our lecture this afternoon