Theopedia

Presbyterian

Presbyterianism is a tradition of Reformed Protestant Christianity marked by church government through graded assemblies of ordained elders, elected by the congregation but deriving their authority from Christ rather than from the people, culminating in synods or general assemblies with binding jurisdiction over member churches.1 It traces its confessional identity to the Westminster Assembly (1643-1649) and its institutional roots to the Scottish Reformation under John Knox, and it shares most of its soteriology with the wider Reformed family, including the 1689 Second London Baptist Confession, differing chiefly over how churches are governed and, in most Presbyterian bodies, over the subjects of baptism.

Historical Origin

The Westminster Assembly, convened by an act of England’s Long Parliament on June 12, 1643, brought together ten lords, twenty commoners, and 121 divines (twenty more were later added) representing “all shades of opinion as to Church Government,” and sat from July 1643 until February 1649.2 The Confession and Catechisms it produced were adopted almost immediately by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, making them Presbyterian church government’s doctrinal standard.2 Scotland’s own Presbyterian institutions predate the Assembly: under the leadership of John Knox, a student of Calvin in Geneva, Scotland became the country in which “Calvinism flourished” most fully after the Reformation, following the Scottish Parliament’s establishment of the Reformation in 1560.3 Knox went on to draft the First Book of Discipline, the constitution of the reformed Kirk.4 From Scotland, Presbyterian churches spread to Ireland and, through Scottish and Ulster immigration together with English and Continental Reformed congregations, to colonial America.

Core Tenets

Christ alone is Head of the Church. Against both the papacy’s claim to headship and any subjection of the church to the state, the Presbyterian system holds that Christ alone is the church’s head and the source of all its authority, ruling it not by force but through his Word and Spirit and through officers who act as his organs rather than as independent powers.5 Berkhof notes that this was fought out “first of all in Scotland,” in the long conflict over the crown’s claim to authority over the Kirk.5

Church power belongs to the whole church, exercised through elected officers. Ecclesiastical power is committed by Christ to the church as a whole, ordinary members and officers together, rather than to the officers as a separate class (the Roman Catholic and Episcopalian view) or to the congregation apart from its officers (the Independent view).6 Officers are elected by the congregation but receive their authority from Christ rather than from the people who choose them, so that “the call of the people is but the confirmation of the inner call by the Lord Himself.”7

Graded, binding assemblies. The power of the church resides first in the governing body of the local congregation, the session (or consistory), and from there is transferred to the “major assemblies, such as classes (presbyteries) and synods or general assemblies,” which hold real jurisdiction over the churches under them rather than merely advising them.8 This graded-court structure gives Presbyterianism its name: the office of elder (Greek presbyteros, “older one”), used interchangeably in the New Testament with overseer (episkopos), is the basic office from which presbyteries and the presbyterian system take their name.9 Presbyterian government further distinguishes teaching elders (ministers), who preach, teach, and administer the sacraments, from ruling elders, who share in governing the congregation without that teaching office.9

Confessional subscription. Presbyterian churches historically require their ministers and elders to subscribe to the Westminster Confession and Catechisms as their doctrinal standard, “subordinate to the Bible.”2 Congregational bodies in England and New England likewise adopted the Westminster Standards, with only small differences, as their own doctrinal basis, and by the seventeenth century “the modern Independents have in a manner laid aside” their own Savoy Declaration “and agreed with the Presbyterians in the use of the Assembly’s Catechisms.”2

Comparison with the Reformed Confessions

The Westminster Confession and the 1689 Second London Baptist Confession share most of Reformed soteriology, but they set church government on opposite foundations. The Westminster Confession holds that “for the better government and further edification of the Church, there ought to be such assemblies as are commonly called synods or councils,” and that it belongs to such assemblies “authoritatively to determine” controversies of faith and cases of maladministration, whose “decrees and determinations, if consonant to the Word of God, are to be received with reverence and submission… as being an ordinance of God.”10 The 1689 confession takes the opposite view of any assembly beyond the local congregation. It commends churches to “hold communion among themselves, for their peace, increase of love, and mutual edification,” and allows that in cases of difficulty “many churches holding communion together” may send messengers “to consider, and give their advice”; but it insists that “these messengers assembled, are not intrusted with any church-power properly so called; or with any jurisdiction over the churches themselves… or to impose their determination on the churches or officers.”11 Where Presbyterian synods govern, Baptist associations only advise: each congregation, on the confessional Baptist view, remains its own highest governing authority under Christ.

Most Presbyterian bodies also differ from the 1689 confession on the subjects of baptism. The Westminster Confession teaches that “not only those that do actually profess faith in and obedience unto Christ, but also the infants of one or both believing parents are to be baptized.”12 The 1689 confession restricts baptism to “those who do actually profess repentance towards God, faith in, and obedience to, our Lord Jesus.”13 (See Infant baptism and Believer’s baptism.)

Related Doctrines

John Knox led the Scottish Reformation that established Presbyterian church government; the Westminster Confession and Westminster Shorter Catechism are its doctrinal standards. Elder and church government treat the office and the governmental question directly. Calvinism is the soteriology Presbyterian churches historically share with the wider Reformed family, and congregationalism and episcopalian government are the alternative polities most often contrasted with it. The Presbyterian Church in America is among the confessionally conservative bodies within the modern Presbyterian family.

References

  1. Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology (London: Banner of Truth Trust, 1969), 563-568, “The Fundamental Principles of the Reformed or Presbyterian System.” ↩

  2. Archibald Alexander Hodge, Outlines of Theology (New York: Robert Carter and Brothers, 1879), chap. 7, “Creeds and Confessions,” 126-127. ↩ ↩2 ↩3 ↩4

  3. Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics: Abridged in One Volume, ed. John Bolt (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011), chap. 2, “The History and Literature of Dogmatic Theology.” ↩

  4. W. Lee, rev. Henry Cowan, “Knox, John,” in Samuel Macauley Jackson, ed., The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, vol. 6 (New York: Funk and Wagnalls, 1910), 362-65. ↩

  5. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 565-566. ↩ ↩2

  6. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 567. ↩

  7. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 567-568. ↩

  8. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 568, “The Power of the Church Resides Primarily in the Governing Body of the Local Church.” ↩

  9. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 569-570, “The Officers of the Church.” ↩ ↩2

  10. The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), chap. 31, “Of Synods and Councils,” parr. 1, 3. ↩

  11. The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1677/1689), chap. 26, “Of the Church,” parr. 14-15. ↩

  12. The Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), chap. 28, “Of Baptism,” para. 4. ↩

  13. The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1677/1689), chap. 29, “Of Baptism,” para. 2. ↩