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The Cambridge Platform: A Reassertion of Ecclesiasatical Authority
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 July 2009
Extract
Since the time of its promulgation in 1648, the Cambridge Platform has been considered one of seventeenth-century New England's most important documents. Its clerical authors regarded it as a vital instrument for maintaining Christ's commandments, and their assessment was correct. The Platform was the recognized standard for Massachusetts Bay's religion until the time of the American Revolution. Its validity was affirmed not only at the time of its creation but also by the Reforming Synod of 1679. The origins of the Cambridge Platform and the forces that brought about the synod of 1646–1648, where it was written, were many and deeply complicated. Foremost among the internal disagreements causing serious difficulties in the colony during the second decade of settlement were the controversies over ecclesiastical polity, church membership and eligibility for baptism. The situation in England, closely related to the disruptions in the colony, also became a vital factor in the writing of the Cambridge Platform.
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References
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8. There are several examples of ministerial counsel and participation in affairs of state that are occasionally cited as examples of viable clerical power, but the ministers intervened almost entirely by presenting advice on an ad hoc basis and, more important, the secular anthorities failed in most cases to heed their counsel. For example, in the case of clerical intervention in a 1632 dispute between Governor Winthrop and Thomas Dudley, the ministers joined the fray on the side of Dudley rather than making common cause with the colony's leading official. This, however, is not genuine evidence of ministerial opposition to secular power, for while clerical support for Dudley might have indicated a number of things, ministerial parity with the civil government was not one of them. It was surely true, at this point in the history of the holy commonwealth, that most ministers and colonists did not want to see the state telling any church what to do, but no matter what most of the ministers and colonists wanted or said they wanted, the situation that developed did not reflect their expressed desires. This was obvious by the time of the Watertown tax protest in 1634. The minister of Watertown, at least one elder and possibly several other persons publicly objected to the payment of certain levies. While this might seem to be another example of clerical resistance to the state, the punishment of the protesters indicated the real distribution of power in the colony (Winthrop, , Journal, 1:74).Google Scholar In a similar vein, John Eliot surely expressed ministerial dissatisfaction when he condemned the manner in which the magistrates treated with the Indians in 1634, but shortly thereafter, the magistrates ordered a ministerial group to dispel him of his erroneous views, and Eliot recanted (ibid., p. 142). Secular dominance was even more apparent in the dispute over primary jurisdiction. In the atmosphere generated by the Antinomian crisis, the churches voluntarily relinquished their claim on the prior right to try offenders against secular and ecclesiastical authority. Three years later when they asked to have it reinstated, their request was refused. In regard to this, one advocate of the existence of clerical power maintained the churches had a “give-and-take in their dealings with the magistrates, for occasionally the government deferred to a church, allowing it to punish someone first” (Hall, p. 135, italics mine). The phrase “give-and take” denoted a measure of equality, but certainly the government occasionally deferring and allowing the church to punish an offender first was not an indication cf parity but of civil dominance.
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28. Ibid., p. 19.
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31. Daniel Cawdrey excoriated Cotton's inconsistencies in Vindiciae Clavium (London, 1645)Google Scholar, prefatory material; Cotton, , The Way of the Congregational Churches Cleared, pp. 307–308.Google Scholar
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37. Ibid., p. 191.
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45. There are numerous examples of secular interference in minor ecclesiastical matters after 1650. See Massachusetts Archives (Ecclesiastical), 10:31–32, 33–34, 35, 36, 44, 47, 48, 49–51, 55, 55a, 82–83, 85–89; RMB, 4:1,Google Scholar 42, 43, 70, 71, 113, 117, 227–228, 236, 309–310, 351, 378, 390, 393.
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