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Subsection
No Rational Human Actions are Indifferent
Some Worship Circumstances are Regulated
Indifferent Things in Worship
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Order of Contents
Historical 3
Westminster
Civil Circumstances in Worship
Benefit may Justify Circumstances in Worship
When Circumstances Join in Acts of Worship
Religious Worship may be in Civil Affairs
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Articles
1200’s
Aquinas, Thomas – pt. 2, pt. 1, question 18, ‘Of the Good & Evil of Human Acts in General’ in Summa
3. ‘Whether man’s action may be good or evil from a circumstance?’ [Yes]
Gillespie largely follows Aquinas on this issue.
“In natural things, it is to be noted that the whole fulness of perfection due to a thing, is not from the mere substantial form that gives it its species since a thing derives much from supervening accidents, as man does from shape, color and the like; and if any one of these accidents be out of due proportion, evil is the result.
So it is with action. For the plenitude of its goodness does not consist wholly in its species, but also in certain additions which accrue to it by reason of certain accidents: and such are its due circumstances. Wherefore if something be wanting that is requisite as a due circumstance the action will be evil.
…
Circumstances are outside an action inasmuch as they are not part of its essence; but they are in an action as accidents thereof…
Every accident is not accidentally in its subject, for some are proper accidents; and of these every art takes notice. And thus it is that the circumstances of actions are considered in the doctrine of morals…
Since good and being are convertible, according as being is predicated of substance and of accident, so is good predicated of a thing both in respect of its essential being, and in respect of its accidental being; and this, both in natural things and in moral actions.”
8. ‘Whether any action may be indifferent in its species?’ [Yes]
“…every action takes its species from its object; while human action, which is called moral, takes its species from the object, in relation to the principle of human actions, which is the reason. Wherefore if the object of an action includes something in accord with the order of reason, it will be a good action according to its species; for instance, to give alms to a person in want. On the other hand, if it includes something repugnant to the order of reason, it will be an evil act according to its species; for instance, to steal, which is to appropriate what belongs to another.
But it may happen that the object of an action does not include something pertaining to the order of reason; for instance, to pick up a straw from the ground, to walk in the fields, and the like: and such actions are indifferent according to their species.”
9. ‘Whether an individual action can be indifferent?’ [No]
“Gregory says in a homily (vi in Evang.): ‘An idle word is one that lacks either the usefulness of rectitude or the motive of just necessity or pious utility.’ But an idle word is an evil, because ‘men… shall render an account of it in the day of judgment’ (Mt. 12:36): while if it does not lack the motive of just necessity or pious utility, it is good. Therefore every word is either good or bad. For the same reason every other action is either good or bad. Therefore no individual action is indifferent.
…It sometimes happens that an action is indifferent in its species, but considered in the individual it is good or evil. And the reason of this is because a moral action… derives its goodness not only from its object, whence it takes its species; but also from the circumstances, which are its accidents, as it were; just as something belongs to a man by reason of his individual accidents, which does not belong to him by reason of his species. And every individual action must needs have some circumstance that makes it good or bad, at least in respect of the intention of the end.
For since it belongs to the reason to direct; if an action that proceeds from deliberate reason be not directed to the due end, it is, by that fact alone, repugnant to reason, and has the character of evil. But if it be directed to a due end, it is in accord with reason; wherefore it has the character of good. Now it must needs be either directed or not directed to a due end. Consequently every human action that proceeds from deliberate reason, if it be considered in the individual, must be good or bad.”
10. ‘Whether a circumstance may place a moral action in the species of good or evil?’ [Yes]
“Place is a circumstance. But place makes a moral action to be in a certain species of evil; for theft of a thing from a holy place is a sacrilege. Therefore a circumstance makes a moral action to be specifically good or bad.
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And in this way, whenever a circumstance has a special relation to reason, either for or against, it must needs specify the moral action whether good or bad.
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It is not every circumstance that places the moral action in the species of good or evil, since not every circumstance implies accord or disaccord with reason.”
“More and less do not change a species. But more and less is a circumstance of additional goodness or malice. Therefore not every circumstance that makes a moral action better or worse, places it in a species of good or evil.”
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1600’s
Ames, William – ch. 1, sections 18-19 in A Fresh Suit Against Human Ceremonies in God’s Worship… (Amsterdam: Thorp, 1633), pp. 87-98
Ames’s opponents had quoted many early reformed divines respecting the ability of the Church to make ordinances about circumstances. While the quotes are very good, the opponents sought to use them to justify human, moral and religious ceremonies (such as a minister signing the cross in baptism, wearing a surplice, etc.). Ames upholds the quotes and responds to his opponents’ use of them.
Gillespie, George – English-Popish Ceremonies (1637)
pt. 3, ch. 7, sections 5-7, pp. 112-15
See Bannerman below for a summary. For Gillespie’s discussion of things that are not ‘circumstances,’ but are purely indifferent, see the Fourth Part of his work.
pt. 4, ‘Against the Indifferency of the Ceremonies’ 47 pp.
Rutherford, Samuel
pp. 48-49 of ch. 1, section 17, ‘Whether not only all the traditions of the Papists, but even new offices, such as the domineering bishop, etc, human ceremonies and whatsoever is of positive observance in divine worship contrived by the Antichrist or the bishops and prelates, conflicts with the completeness and perfection of the Scriptures?…’ in Rutherford’s Examination of Arminianism: the Tables of Contents with Excerpts from Every Chapter tr. Charles Johnson & Travis Fentiman (1668; RBO, 2019)
Intro, section 1, pp. 1-6 of The Divine Right of Church Government… (London: 1646)
Owen, John – pp. 41-44 & 48 of ch. 7 in A Discourse concerning Liturgies & their Imposition (London, 1662)
Owen distinguishes between circumstances of worship insofar as they are circumstances of general human actions, and also of necessary adjuncts of worship.
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1800’s
Bannerman, James – pp. 354-58 of The Church of Christ, vol. 1, Division II, Chapter II, ‘Rites and Ceremonies in Public Worship’
Bannerman, of the Free Church of Scotland, in his classic work on the Church, summarizes the three principles of George Gillespie in what defines a ‘circumstance’. Circumstances in worship must:
1. ‘only be a circumstance of divine worship, and no substantial part of it–no sacred, significant, efficacious ceremony;’
2. ‘be such as are not determinable by Scripture;’
3. be those for the appointment of which she is ‘able to give a sufficient reason and warrant.’
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Order of Quotes
Beza
Powel
Gillespie
Owen
Baxter
Willard
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Quotes
1500’s
Theodore Beza
A Clear & Simple Treatise on the Lord’s Supper (RHB, 2016), p. 143
“First of all, I hold that it is proper for the ceremonies in the church to be absolutely as few and as pure as possible. For besides the fact that we must now worship the Lord in Spirit and truth, even plain experience, that teacher of fools, ought to warn us not to imitate the example of those who–while setting no limit on their ceremonies–do not increase the worship of God, but completely undermine it. And so we determined that we should take thought how to do away with ceremonies rather than establishing them.”
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1600’s
Gabriel Powel
Powel, Gabriel – De adiaphoris, Theological & Scholastical Positions concerning the Nature & Use of Things Indifferent. Where also is Methodically & Briefely Handled, of Civil & Ecclesiastical Magistrates, of Human Laws, of Christian Liberty, of Scandal & of the Worship of God (London, 1607), ch. 11, ‘A Solution of the Objections opposed by the Refractary Ministers’, pp. 74-75 Powel (baptised 1576–1611) was a Welsh Anglican minister.
“To the proposition, ‘What things are done for the glory of God,’ to wit, of themselves; that is, such things as are commanded by God to this special end and purpose, that by those works we might declare our obedience towards Him: they are the worship of God.
And not such [things] as serve for the glory of God accidentally, that is, such as do sometimes serve for the performance of those things which are commanded by God for accidental causes and circumstances, which if they concur not, yet God may be honored as well by such as omit them as by those that perform them, so they be omitted or performed of faith, which causes the person to be reconciled unto God and makes the doing or omission of all indifferent actions to agree and stand with the Will of God.”
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George Gillespie
English-Popish Ceremonies ([1637]), pt. 4, ch. 3, pp. 6-7
“When we measure the goodness or the badness of a human action, we must not only measure it by the object and the end, but by all the circumstances which accompany it. Fed. Morellus upon those words of Seneca, Refert quid, cui, quando, quare, ubi, etc. says that without those circumstances of things, persons, times, places, facti ratio non constat [it does not consist with reason of fact]. Circumstances sometimes constituunt rerum earum quae aguntur speciem [establish those things which direct the species], say our divines, meaning that circumstances do make an action good or bad. Humani actus [a human action] say the Schoolmen, non solum ex objectis, verum ex circumstantiis boni vel mali esse dicuntur.
It is not every mans part, (says one of our opposites) to judge de circumstantia, quae reddit actionem vel bonam vel malam. Some circumstances says another of them, are intrinsical and essential to actions, and specially making up their nature. The principal circumstances which here we speak of, are comprehended in this versicle:
‘Quis, Quid, Ubi, Quibus auxiliis, Cur, Quomodo, Quando.’ [‘Who, what, where, by what means, why, what way, when.’]”
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John Owen
A Discourse concerning Liturgies & their Imposition (London, 1662), ch. 7, p. 42
“Circumstances are either such as follow actions as actions, or such as are arbitrarily superadded and adjoined by command unto actions, which do not of their own accord, nor naturally nor necessarily attend them. Now religious actions in the worship of God are actions still. Their religious relation does not destroy their natural being. Those circumstances then which do attend such actions as actions, not determined by divine institution may be ordered, disposed of, and regulated by the prudence of men.
For instance, prayer is a part of God’s worship. Public prayer is so, as appointed by Him. This as it is an action to be performed by man cannot be done without the assignment of time, and place, and sundry other things, if order and conveniency be attended. These are circumstances that attend all actions of that nature to be performed by a community, whether they relate to the worship of God or no. These men may according as they see good regulate and change as there is occasion: I mean they may do so who are acknowledged to have power in such things. As the action cannot be without them, so their regulation is arbitrary if they come not under some divine disposition and order, as that of time in general does.
There are also some things which some men call circumstances also, that no way belong of themselves to the actions whereof they are said to be the circumstances, nor do attend them, but are imposed on them, or annexed unto them, by the arbitrary authority of those who take upon them to give order and rules in such cases. Such is to pray before an image, or towards the East, or to use this or that form of prayer in such Gospel administrations and no other. These are not circumstances attending the nature of the thing itself, but are arbitrarily superadded to the things that they are appointed to accompany.”
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Richard Baxter
Catholic Communion Doubly Defended by [Against] Dr. Owen’s Vindicator… (London: Parkhurst, 1684), section 2, p. 11
“XIV. God has by Nature and Scripture obliged men themselves to choose and determine diverse subordinate expressions, significations, modes, circumstances, or accidents of this universal religion, which are not themselves meet for an universal, and unchangeable, obligation, but local, temporary, and mutable:
Some of which every man may choose for himself, some the present pastor must choose, some the associated pastors may choose, and some the magistrate may choose. These must be added to the universal duties, so far is such addition from being sin: I have often named many particulars, as:
the translation of the Scripture, which to choose: the version of the psalms in rhythm, or metre, the common use of new made hymns, the dividing the Scripture into chapter and verse; the words of sermons; their method; the particular text to be chosen; what chapters to read; at what hour to begin; how long to preach; in what words to pray, whether the same oft, or changed; whether fore-studied, or not, whether written, or unwritten: whether studied, and written by ourselves, or by others; where the place shall be, where the pulpit, [baptismal] font, table, etc. shall stand; what ornaments they shall have, linen, silk, silver vessels or otherwise? Whether we be bare-headed, or covered at prayer, sacrament, etc. Whether we shall kneel, stand, sit, or be prostrate at prayer, etc. what distinctive garments pastors shall use.
By what signs of consent and obligation men vow, and swear, whether by putting the hand under the thigh, lifting it up, subscribing, laying it on the Book [Bible], kissing the Book, etc. what catechisms to use, with many more such.
God has commanded men to choose such things as these by the rules of edification, love, peace, concord, order, decency, winning those without, etc.”
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Samuel Willard
The Sinfulness of Worshipping God with Men’s Institutions, as it was Delivered in a Sermon (Boston, 1691), pp. 7-8
“Though these [circumstances of worship] also, when they have a religious respect put on them, are made essential, and come under the things our Saviour here refers to [Mat. 15:9]. But a thing may then be said to be made a part of worship, when it hath such an holiness put upon it, as to be reputed a medium of our communion with God. And this is not to be judged of by what men say of it, but by the necessary consequence of the usage of it.”
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Historical Theology
On the Post-Reformation
R. Scott Clark
Recovering the Reformed Confession (P&R, 2008), pp. 229-30
“The classical and confessional understanding of this principle [the RPW] led the Reformed churches to distinguish between two aspects of worship: elements and circumstances.
This distinction was a corollary to the distinction between a substance and an accident. A substance is that which makes a thing what it is. An accident is something that is temporarily connected or related to the substance but such that it can be changed without changing the substance.”
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Matthew Winzer
‘The Constitutional Principle of the Scottish Reformation: 1547-1648’ in Scottish Reformation Society Historical Journal, 2012, vol. 2, pp. 1-42
“This comprehensive application of the [Scriptural] rule [articulated by Rutherford] was necessitated because the advocates for human ceremonies had argued that such things might be justified as circumstances of worship. It was maintained that circumstances which were not forbidden were lawful if they were edifying. Their reformed opponents quickly saw that this argument effectively created a class of religious actions which were beside the Word in matters of faith and worship.
Their response was clear and concise: any action which served as a means of worship was a moral action and required the warrant of God’s Word. To the point, Rutherford asserted, “In actions or religious means of worship, and actions moral, whatever is beside the Word of God is against the Word of God”. (Divine Right of Church Government, 1646, [Intro, section 2], pp. 19-20)”
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Westminster
Confession of Faith
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On Civil Circumstances in Worship
Article
Ames, William – pp. 53-59 of ch. 5, ‘Of the Sorts & Differences of Ceremonies’ in A Fresh Suit Against Human Ceremonies in God’s Worship… (Amsterdam: Thorp, 1633), Manuduction
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Not an Absolute Necessity Alone, but a Moral Necessity of Benefit may Justify Circumstances in Worship
Articles
Gillespie, George – English-Popish Ceremonies (1637)
pt. 3, ch. 7, section 7, point 3, pp. 114-15
pt. 4, ch. 3, pp. 17-18
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When & How Circumstances Properly Join, or are Included in, Acts of Worship, or Not
See also, ‘Homage to Images is Wrong Despite Intentions Otherwise’.
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Intro
Circumstances are properly included in acts of worship when they are applied to the immediate honor of God. In this way natural actions and honor applied to God become worship, due to the religious object.
When circumstances are not applied to the immediate honor of God, they are at best only included in those worship acts in a general way, by decency and order (3rd Commandment; 1 Cor. 14:40), which principles are common with other human actions.
This distinction is very important, as it is often the difference between lawful worship and idolatry.
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Order of Contents
Quotes 4
Articles 3
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Order of Quotes
Aquinas
Ames
Gillespie
Beverley
Mastricht
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Quotes
Aquinas
Summa, pt. 2, pt. 1, Question 101, ‘Of the Ceremonial Precepts in Themselves’, Article 1, ‘Whether the nature of the ceremonial precepts consists in their pertaining to the worship of God?’, Reply to Objection 1. While Aquinas’s teaching can be taken too far, as Romanists have taken it in setting apart as holy the many various instruments involved with the mass, yet there is an aspect of truth in the teaching.
“The Divine worship includes not only sacrifices and the like, which seem to be directed to God immediately, but also those things whereby His worshippers are duly prepared to worship Him: thus too in other matters, whatever is preparatory to the end comes under the science whose object is the end.
Accordingly those precepts of the Law which regard the clothing and food of God’s worshippers, and other such matters, pertain to a certain preparation of the ministers, with the view of fitting them for the Divine worship: just as those who administer to a king make use of certain special observances. Consequently such are contained under the ceremonial precepts.”
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William Ames
The Marrow of Theology, trans. John Eusden (1628; Grand Rapids: Baker, 1997), bk. 2, ch. 14, ‘The Manner of Divine Worship’, p. 283
“These [circumstances] are such close adjuncts of religious worship that in a secondary sense they partake of the meaning and nature of it. Observance of them promotes not only the honor of God which is found in both the natural and the instituted worship of God, but also a certain special honor to Him in that their observance is connected with natural and instituted worship by his command and in a direct and immediate way.”
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A Fresh Suit Against Human Ceremonies in God’s Worship (Amsterdam: Thorp, 1633), Manuduction, ch. 12, section 2, p. 145
“Fasting may be called worship by a trope, as being a special adjunct of some extraordinary worship, and yet not be a special kind of immediate reductive worship, or any other kind.”
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George Gillespie
English-Popish Ceremonies (1637), pt. 3, ch. 4,
p. 58
“…the Bishop’s own words. For he says that we kneel before the elements [of the Supper], ‘having them in our sight, or object to our senses, as ordinary signs, means, and memorials, to stir us up, to worship, etc.’ Now if we have them in our sight and before our senses for this purpose, that they may be means, signs, and memorials to stir us up to worship, then (sure) their being really before our senses is not accidental to us when we kneel. Since Dr. Burgess has been so dull and sottish as to write that ‘the signs are but accidentally before the communicants when they receive,’ he is to be ignominiously exsibilat; for making the sacred sacramental signs to be no otherwise present than the walls of the Church, the nails and timber of the material table whereupon the elements are set, or anything else accidentally before the communicants.”
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p. 69
“Where they have read that the people bowed before the altar of God, I know not. Bishop Lindsey indeed would prove from 2 Chron. 6:12-13 and Mic. 6:6 that the people bowed before the altar and the offering. But the first of those places speaks nothing of kneeling before the altar, but only of kneeling before the congregation, that is, in sight of the congregation. And if Solomon had then kneeled before the altar, yet the altar had been but occasionally and accidentally before him in his adoration, for to what end and use could he have purposely set the altar before him whiles he was kneeling and praying?
The place of Micah cannot prove that God’s people did kneel before the offerings at all (for it speaks only of bowing before God) far less that they kneeled before them in the very act of offering, and that with their minds and senses fixed upon them, as we kneel [speaking of Gillespie’s opponents] in the very act of receiving the sacrament, and at that instant when our minds and senses are fastened upon the signs, that we may discern the things signified by them, for the exercising of our hearts in a thankful meditation upon the Lord’s death.”
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pp. 70-71
“Though a penitentiary kneel to God purposely in the presence and sight of the congregation, that he may make known to them his repentance for the sin whereby he has scandalized them, yet is the confessing of his sin to God kneeling there upon his knees, an immediate worship, neither does the congregation come betwixt him and God as belonging to the substance of this worship, for he kneels to God as well and makes confession of his sin when the congregation is not before him. But I suppose our kneelers themselves will confess that the elements come so betwixt God and them when they kneel that they belong to the essence of the worship in hand, and that they would not, nor could not worship the flesh and blood of Christ in the sacrament if the elements were not before them.
To be short, the case of a penitentiary stands thus, that not in his kneeling simpliciter, but in his kneeling publicly and in sight of the congregation, he sets them before him, purposely and with a respect to them: Whereas our kneelers do kneel in such sort that their kneeling simpliciter, and without an adjection or adjunct, has a respect to the elements purposely set before them, neither would they at all kneel, for that end and purpose for which they do kneel, namely, for worshipping the flesh and blood of Christ in the sacrament, except the elements were before the eyes both of their minds and bodies; as the penitentiary does kneel, for making confession of his sin to God, when the congregation is not before him.
… For the very kneeling itself (simply considered) before the elements, respects them as then purposely set in our sight, that we may kneel before them: whereas in the case of the penitentiary, it is not his kneeling to confess his sin to God, which has a respect to the congregation as set in his sight for that purpose; But some circumstances of his kneeling only, to wit, When? At that time when the congregation is assembled; and where? Publicly in sight of the congregation. In regard of these circumstances, he has the congregation purposely in his sight, and so respects them; But in regard of the kneeling itself simply, the presence of the congregation is but accidental to him who kneels, and confesses his sin before God.
As touching giving thanks before the meat set on our common tables, though a man should do it kneeling, yet this speaks not home to the point now in controversy, except a man so kneel before his meat, that he have a religious respect to it, as a thing separated from a common use and made holy, and likewise have both his mind and his external senses of seeing, touching, and tasting fastened upon it in the act of his kneeling. And if a man should thus kneel before his meat, he were an idolater.
Lastly, giving thanks before the elements of bread and wine in the beginning of the holy action, is as far from the purpose: For this giving of thanks is an immediate worship of God wherein we have our minds and senses not upon the bread & wine, as upon things which have a state in that worship of the Lord’s Supper, and belong to the substance of the same (for the very consecration of them to this use, is but then in fieri), but we worship God immediately by prayer and giving of thanks: Which is all otherwise in the act of receiving [the bread and wine].”
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p. 73
“…one of our doctors objects that we lift up our eyes and our hands to heaven and worship God, yet do not worship the heaven: that a man going to bed prays before his bed: that David offered the sacrifices of thanksgiving in the presence of all the people, Ps. 116, that Paul having taken bread gave thanks before all them who were in the ship, Acts 27:35, that the Israelites worshipped before Moses and Aaron, Ex. 4:31.
Hereupon another doctor harping on the same string tells us that when we kneel in the act of receiving the sacrament, we kneel no more to bread than to the pulpit when we join our prayers with the ministers. Oh, unworthy instances and reproachful to doctors! All these things were and are accidentally present to the worshippers and not purposely before them, not respected as having a religious state in the worship. What? do we worship before the bread in the sacrament even as before a pulpit, a bed, etc? Nay, graduate men should understand better what they speak of.”
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Thomas Beverley
The Principles of Protestant Truth & Peace in Four Treatises (London, 1683), ‘The Woe of Scandal’, pp. 39-40
“2. They [indifferent things] are not of the scale of those things,
wherein that order, of which God, by the very laws of rational nature is the author, stands… so that though this order runs, or ought to run along, and conduct all human actions, and so is not in itself a point of religion, yet when it is applied to religious services and actions, does indeed commend our religious actions and services to God, and the contrary is an evil.
3. Of the same account is that εὐσχημονία, or decency of religious actions, required by God before Himself… of which the apostle discourses: ‘Every man praying with his head uncovered, dishonoureth his head’ [1 Cor. 11:4]… such a distinction of sexes being founded in nature; and in what is beyond nature, the grave customs of ages and places, carry a great weight of determination.”
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Peter van Mastricht
Theoretico-practica theologia, 2nd ed. (d. 1706; Utrecht: Muntend, 1698), tome 2, bk. 6, ch. 7, §20, p. 728, trans. Todd Rester & Michael Spangler
“those constitutions and ceremonies which… strive to direct the worship constituted by God with respect to circumstantial matters of places and times, for εὐταξία καὶ εὐσχημονία, ‘good order and decency’… they acknowledge [in these] something divine and something human: they are divine with respect to the foundation, insofar as God generally prescribes that all things be done in good order and decently (1 Cor. 14:40), and human with respect to the particular determination, whereby this or that is said to aim at good order and decency.”
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Articles
1600’s
Ames, William – pp. 57-61 of ch. 5, ‘Of the Sorts & Differences of Ceremonies’ in A Fresh Suit Against Human Ceremonies in God’s Worship… (Amsterdam: Thorp, 1633), Manuduction
Corbet, John –
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2000’s
Fentiman, Travis – pp. 73-84 & 87-89 in 1 Corinthians – Head-Coverings are Not Perpetual & they were Hair-Buns, with or without Cloth Material: Proven (RBO, 2022)
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Religious Worship & Ceremonies may be Used in Civil Affairs
Quote
William Ames
A Fresh Suit Against Human Ceremonies in God’s Worship… (Amsterdam: Thorp, 1633), ch. 1, section 16, ‘Concerning an Argument Against our Ceremonies, out of 1 Cor. 14’, pp. 73-74
“Sacred things applied to civil business do not therefore become civil, for who will say that prayer at the beginning of a Parliament is a civil act, though it were used in the Upper and Lower House, and applied to that civil meeting as it ought to be? And why then shall application of civil decency unto sacred buisiness make it alter the nature or name of it?”
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Article
Ames, William – pp. 56-57 of ch. 5, ‘Of the Sorts & Differences of Ceremonies’ in A Fresh Suit Against Human Ceremonies in God’s Worship… (Amsterdam: Thorp, 1633), Manuduction
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