Chapter XXIII. Of the Civil Magistrate
Chapter XXIII. Of the Civil Magistrate
Chapter XXIII. Of the Civil Magistrate | Revisions of the WCF - Westminster Standards
III. The civil magistrate may not assume to himself the administration of the Word and sacraments; or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven: yet he hath authority, and it is his duty, to take order, that unity and peace be preserved in the Church, that the truth of God be kept pure and entire; that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed; all corruptions and abuses in worship and discipline prevented or reformed; and all the ordinances of God duly settled, administered, and observed. For the better effecting whereof, he hath power to call synods, to be present at them, and to provide that whatsoever is transacted in them be according to the mind of God.
Revision of 1788:
III. Civil magistrates may not assume to themselves the administration of the Word and sacraments;
or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven;
or, in the least, interfere in matters of faith.
Yet, as nursing fathers, it is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the church of our common Lord,
without giving the preference to any denomination of Christians above the rest,
in such a manner that all ecclesiastical persons whatever
shall enjoy the full, free, and unquestioned liberty of discharging every part of their sacred functions,
without violence or danger.
And, as Jesus Christ hath appointed a regular government and discipline in his church,
no law of any commonwealth should interfere with, let, or hinder, the due exercise thereof,
among the voluntary members of any denomination of Christians,
according to their own profession and belief. It is the duty of civil magistrates to protect the person
and good name of all their people, in such an effectual manner as that no person be suffered,
either upon pretense of religion or of infidelity, to offer any indignity, violence, abuse, or injury to any other person whatsoever:
and to take order, that all religious and ecclesiastical assemblies be held without molestation or disturbance.
What changed, and when. It is the greatest change of all: in 1788 the paragraph was rewritten almost entirely.
Only the first sentence was kept, the one which forbids the magistrate to preach, to administer the sacraments or to exercise discipline.
The same Synod carried the change into the Larger Catechism: in the list of sins forbidden in the second commandment (answer 109)
it struck out the words "tolerating a false religion".
Why. For the same reasons as in chapter XX: the exception of 1729, the experience of the intrusion of the civil power, the situation of the new republic and, above all, the change of mind there described. It is commonly presented as a defence against the abuse of the State's authority in the affairs of the Church. But it is no mere retouching: these are two different ideas of what the magistrate ought to do. In the text of 1647 he has the duty to uphold the true religion and to restrain the false; in that of 1788 he may not prefer any denomination, and his duty is to protect all of them alike, and all persons.
What the text of 1647 rested on. The Assembly cites Isaiah 49:23, Psalm 122:9, Ezra 7:23, Ezra 7:25-28 and 2 Chronicles 19:8-11. The revision keeps the image of the "nursing fathers" of Isaiah 49:23, but gives it a different content.
What this change shows. Here the entry is visible in the vocabulary itself. Three expressions of the text of 1788 have no equivalent in that of 1647:
the Church appears parcelled out, each part a "denomination of Christians", all equal before the State;
her members are "voluntary members", like those of an association;
and the magistrate must prevent the injury that may be done "either upon pretense of religion or of infidelity", so that the two are set on the same level.
It is the language of the political liberalism of its century, placed within a confession of faith.
Those who defend the revision reply that the Assembly's texts speak of the kings of Judah or of a king of Persia
and do not fix a rule for every ruler, and that to give the magistrate authority over doctrine is to hand the Church over to him.
The Assembly was not unaware of that danger: the same paragraph begins by denying him the Word, the sacraments and the keys.
What it maintained is what has historically been called the establishment principle.
It is not a theocracy, nor does it confound the two jurisdictions: Church and State are distinct, and neither may invade the office of the other.
But the ruler, as ruler, ought to acknowledge and serve Christ, and to uphold his Church.
Two clarifications, so as not to attribute to the revision what it does not say.
The text of 1788 is not secularist: it still speaks of "the church of our common Lord"
and binds the magistrate to protect the person of all his people.
He who today regards opposition to abortion or to euthanasia as a breach of the separation between Church and State
has gone much further than the revisers of 1788; but he has kept walking along the road which they opened.
Nor does the text of 1647 ask that the civil law of the Old Testament be simply applied as it stands:
the Confession teaches that those judicial laws expired together with the state of Israel
and oblige only so far as their general equity may require (chapter XIX, paragraph IV).