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A Seventeenth-Century Reformed Liturgy of Penance and Reconciliation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2009

Bryan D. Spinks
Bryan D. Spinks
Affiliation:
Churchill College, Cambridge
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Extract

In the Babylonian Captivity, 1520, Luther launched an attack on the number of ordinances which the medieval Western Church labelled ‘sacraments’. According to Luther, only three were worthy of the title sacrament: baptism, the bread, and penance. Although critical of the prevailing penitential system, Luther not only defended the sacramental status of penance, but also the practice of auricular confession:

As to the current practice of private confession, I am heartily in favor of it, even though it cannot be proved from the Scriptures. It is useful, even necessary, and I would not have it abolished.

Type
Research Article
Information
Scottish Journal of Theology , Volume 42 , Issue 2 , May 1989 , pp. 183 - 197
Copyright
Copyright © Scottish Journal of Theology Ltd 1989

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References

1 Babylonian Captivity, in Luther's Works (LW) (Philadelphia and St Louis 1955.) 36:18.

2 LW 36:86. See also Walty, Jean-Nicolas, ‘Remission Des Péchés chez Luther’, in Liturgie et Rémission Des Péchés, Conférences Saint-Serge XXe Semaine d'Etudes Liturgiques (Rome, 1975), 265–272.Google Scholar

3 LW 53.

4 Trans. Furcha, E. J., Huldrych Zwingli. Writings vol. 1 (Allison Park, Pa., 1984), 116–120.Google Scholar

5 Institute 4:xix. 17.

6 Caswell, R. N., ‘Calvin's View of Ecclesiastical Discipline’, in John Calvin, ed. Duffield, G. E., Courtenay Studies in Reformation Theology (Appleford, Berks., 1966), 210–226; 213.Google Scholar

7 White, Robert, ‘Oil and Vinegar: Calvin on Church Discipline’, in Scottish Journal of Theology 38 (1986), 25–40; 37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 See Torrance, T. F., The Eldership in The Reformed Church (Edinburgh 1984)Google Scholar for further discussion of this distinction.

9 Institute 4.xii.1.

10 R. White, art. cit., 39, referring to Sermon on Galatians 6:1–2.

11 Caswell, op. cit., 218, quoting Letters 1:160ff.

12 Kendall, R. T., Calvin and English Calvinism to 1649 (London 1979)Google Scholar; Helm, Paul, Calvin and the Calvinists (Edinburgh 1982).Google Scholar

13 Davies, Horton, The Worship of the English Puritans (London 1948), 236.Google Scholar

14 Ames, op. cit.

15 Owen, John, The True Nature of a Gospel Church, in Works, Banner of Truth Reprint, vol. 16, 161.Google Scholar

16 Institute 4.xii.7.

17 Institute 4.xii.6.

18 McMillan, W., The Worship of the Scottish Reformed Church 1550–1638 (London 1931), 338.Google Scholar

19 Sprott, G. W. and Leishman, T., The Book of Common Order of the Church of Scotland (Edinburgh 1868), 69.Google Scholar

20 McMillan, op. cit., 338.

21 For further details, Spinks, Bryan D., Freedom or Order? (Allison Park, Pa., 1984)Google Scholar, chapter 3.

22 Ed. Orme, W., The Practical Works of the Rev. Richard Baxter, (London 1830), vol. 10. 121.Google Scholar

23 Ibid., vol. 19. chapter 19. Question 21. 101.

24 Ibid.

25 Ibid., vol. 5, 109.

26 Ibid, vol. 6, 524.

27 Ibid., vol. 6, 525.

28 lbid., vol. 6, 520–1.

29 Ibid.