DOCSLIB.ORG

EB WARD Diary

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
EB WARD Diary THE DIARY OF SAMUEL WARD, A TRANSLATOR OF THE 1611 KING JAMES BIBLE Transcribed and prepared by Dr. M.M. Knappen, Professor of English History, University of Chicago. Edited by John W. Cowart Bluefish Books Cowart Communications Jacksonville, Florida www.bluefishbooks.info THE DIARY OF SAMUEL WARD, A TRANSLATOR OF THE 1611 KING JAMES BIBLE. Copyright © 2007 by John W. Cowart. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America by Lulu Press. Apart from reasonable fair use practices, no part of this book’s text may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address Bluefish Books, 2805 Ernest St., Jacksonville, Florida, 32205. Library of Congress Cataloging-in- Publication Data has been applied for. Lulu Press # 1009823. Bluefish Books Cowart Communications Jacksonville, Florida www.bluefishbooks.info SAMUEL WARD 1572 — 1643 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION …………………………………..…. 1 THE TWO SAMUEL WARDS……………………. …... 13 SAMUEL WARD’S LISTIING IN THE DICTIONARY OF NATIONAL BIOGRAPHY…. …. 17 DR. M.M. KNAPPEN’S PREFACE ………. …………. 21 THE PURITAN CHARACTER IN THE DIARY. ….. 27 DR. KNAPPEN’S LIFE OF SAMUEL WARD …. …... 43 THE DIARY TEXT …………………………….……… 59 THE 1611 TRANSLATORS’ DEDICATION TO THE KING……………………………………….… 97 THE 1611 TRANSLATORS’ PREFACE TO BIBLE READERS ………………………………………….….. 101 BIBLIOGRAPHY ……………………………….…….. 129 INTRODUCTION by John W. Cowart amuel Ward, a moderate Puritan minister, lived from 1572 to S1643. His life spanned from the reign of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth, through that of King James. and into the days of Charles I. Surviving pages of Ward’s dated diary entries run from May 11, 1595, to July 1, 1632. During much of her reign, the Virgin Queen manipulated religious factions in her realm by threatening to marry a Catholic — or not. Her appointed bishops threatened to defrock all Puritans who refuse to wear the mandated ecclesiastical gowns — a burr of contention often mentioned in Ward’s diary. Another source of tension between the Puritans and the established church involved which Bible to use. The queen and bishops favored the Bishops’ Bible which she had translated in 1569. The Puritans, Reformers, Presbyterians, and Separatists favored the Geneva Bible published in 1560. It was the first Bible to contain verse numbers so readers could easily locate specific Scriptures. However it also contained Calvinist marginal notes which established church officials felt inflammatory. 2 Feelings ran high on the matter. On March 24, 1603, King James ascended to the throne. The very next year, he convened the Hampton Court Conference to iron out differences between religious factions in his new kingdom. One result of that conference was the commissioning of a new translation of the Bible, the Authorized Version or King James Bible. Working in six committees, 47 scholars from the University of Cambridge, the University of Oxford, and from Westminster Abby undertook the translation. Each scholar worked independently, without pay, then each committee reviewed, revised, harmonized, and standardized their work. Samuel Ward served on the translation committee of the Second Cambridge Company which was comprised of the finest biblical and linguistic scholars of the day. In January, 1609, the General Committee Of Review met at Stationer’s Hall, London, to review the complete work of the six companies. Publisher Robert Barker issued the first printing of the King James Bible as a folio edition in 1611. Each page was printed on a cotton sheet measuring 16 ½ by 10 ½ inches. A bound copy cost 12 shillings. The translators dedicated the volumn “To The Most High And Mighty Prince James, By The Grace Of God, King Of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, Defender Of The Faith, &c.” They wrote a Preface To Readers outlining the reasons this translation improved on former ones. Their Preface details their history, methods and sources. It explaines the principles guiding their work and how they built on former English translations. “Truly (good Christian Reader),” they wrote, “Wee never thought from the beginning, that we should neede to make a new Translation, nor yet to make of a bad one a good one … but to make a good one better, or out of many good ones, one principall good one, not justly to be excepted against; that hath bene our indeavour, that our marke”. A copy of this Preface, broken into shorter paragraphs for easier reading, follows the text of Ward’s Diary in this book. 3 In 1569 the portrait of Queen Elizabeth I appeared on the title page of the Bishops’ Bible. 4 Puritans favored the Geneva Bible with its “Moste profitable annotations”. 5 Title Page of the 1611 King James Bible 6 Yet having an authorized version of the Bible did not resolve differences among English Christians. This 1641 handbill shows how the established church regarded Reformers and Puritans: Samuel Ward tried to walk a thin line between Puritan and Established Church factions. While perusing his academic career at Cambridge, he preached solid Puritan sermons, yet rose to become the royal chaplain for King James, head of the Established Church. Although during Elizabeth’s reign England had repelled the Spanish Armada, and although the Catholic Gunpowder Plot attempted to assassinate King James, he sought peace with Catholic Spain. He send Charles, the crown prince, to the Spanish court to arrange a marriage with a Spanish princess. This development horrified English Puritans but that marriage fell through. Charles married Princess Henrietta Maria of France, a Catholic, in 1625; his own subjects beheaded him in 1649. Samuel Ward’s diary reveals that while he cared deeply about larger academic, political and church polity matters, his main concern was his own walk with Christ. He writes to remind himself of his daily sins and faults — and to remember God’s blessings to him. The twin themes of this diary are repentance and thankfulness. 7 This book draws heavily from the scholarly work of Dr. Marshall Mason Knappen, assistant professor of English History at the University of Chicago. Dr. Knappen transcribed the original text, researched extensive footnotes, wrote an introduction, drafted a biography of Rogers, and published the text in 1933. His work, Two Elizabethan Puritan Diaries, forms the basis of this present edition. My role in presenting this edition is one of rendering it readable and available to modern readers. In his zeal for preserving the text for researchers, Dr. Knappen retained Rogers’ 16th Century spelling, abbreviations, capitalization, and punctuation. He inserted diacritical indicators on every page. While these tools may prove invaluable to the scholar, they distract me in my own reading of the diary for its spiritual inspiration. So many words have changed spelling since 1587 that as I entered these diaries in Word on my computer, Clippie, that little talking paperclip man on the Help menu, pops out and says, “There are too many spelling and grammatical errors in WardDiary.doc to continue displaying them. To check the spelling and grammar of this document, chose Spelling and Grammar from the TOOLS menu”. For instance Here are the opening paragraphs of Ward’s diary: Prid, Desir of vaynglory, yea, in little things. Wearisomnes in Godes service. Non affection. No delite in Godes service. No care of exhorting my brethren. Non boldnes in the professing of Godes name. No delite in hearing Godes word, or in prayer, or in receyving of the Sacramentes. Shame in serving God. May 11, 1595. Thy dulness in the morning in prayer. Thy little affection in hearing Mr. Chattertons1 good sermon upon the 34 verse of the 25 of Math. Thy adulterous thoughtes that day. Thy backwardnes in calling to mind the sermons that day. Thy backwardnes in exhorting S[ir] S[harp],2 neverthelesse the good 1 Laurence Chatterton or Chaderton, formerly a fellow of Christ's, but at this time Master of Emmanuel College. His wife was a sister of the Ezekiel Culverwel who is mentioned in the Rogers diary. See DNB. 2 Ward's roommate, Isaac Sharp, later rector of Thorpe-juxta-Newark, Notts. 8 motions of Godes spiritt in thy mynd. Thy anger against M[r.] N[ewhouse]3 for his long prayers. May 12, 1595. My evil thoughts of M[r.] N[ewhouse] when I heard him beginning to expound a place in Ecclesiastes. My negligence in not comming to prayers, and my little care for the same. Think if thou were in Turky, thou would be glad to have them to pray with, as little account as thou now makest thereof. May 13, 1595. My little pity of the boy who was whipt in the hall.4 My desire of preferment over much. My adulterous dream. Yes, words change and new ones appear even today. Why, when a young lady offered to show me her bling, I got all excited till I found out she was showing nothing but a stupid charm bracelet! So I am updating Ward’s Elizabethan vernacular as best I can. I hope to make these diary pages readable for people today because they show the writer’s walk with Christ; therefore, they help me in my own walk. Few books help me more than the diaries, journals, and blogs of other Christians. And when I read my own diaries from years past, they help me live my life today a little better. Seeing where I’ve been helps me see where I’m going. Apparently Samuel Ward enjoyed that same experience. A word needs to be said about how Ward used the possessive; instead of the apostrophe S familiar today, (Joe’s dog), Ward used the construction of a man’s name followed by “his whatever” (Joe his dog). Thus we read “Mr.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Lesser Feasts and Fasts 2018
    Lesser Feasts and Fasts 2018 Conforming to General Convention 2018 1 Preface Christians have since ancient times honored men and women whose lives represent heroic commitment to Christ and who have borne witness to their faith even at the cost of their lives. Such witnesses, by the grace of God, live in every age. The criteria used in the selection of those to be commemorated in the Episcopal Church are set out below and represent a growing consensus among provinces of the Anglican Communion also engaged in enriching their calendars. What we celebrate in the lives of the saints is the presence of Christ expressing itself in and through particular lives lived in the midst of specific historical circumstances. In the saints we are not dealing primarily with absolutes of perfection but human lives, in all their diversity, open to the motions of the Holy Spirit. Many a holy life, when carefully examined, will reveal flaws or the bias of a particular moment in history or ecclesial perspective. It should encourage us to realize that the saints, like us, are first and foremost redeemed sinners in whom the risen Christ’s words to St. Paul come to fulfillment, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” The “lesser feasts” provide opportunities for optional observance. They are not intended to replace the fundamental celebration of Sunday and major Holy Days. As the Standing Liturgical Commission and the General Convention add or delete names from the calendar, successive editions of this volume will be published, each edition bearing in the title the date of the General Convention to which it is a response.
    [Show full text]
  • Puritans, Lawyers, and Politics in Early Seventeenth Century England
    REVIEWS PURITANS, LAWYERS, AND POLITICS IN EARLY SEVENTEENTH CENTURY ENG- LAND. By John Dykstra Eusden. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958. Pp. xii, 238. $4.50. THE preface of this book reveals a scholar functioning in the best tradition of his profession. Aware that scholarship is fundamentally a cooperative enter- prise and yet that an author must ultimately "stand alone," Eusden acknowl- edges an indebtedness to many and modestly rates his own contribution to historical knowledge. Candidly, also, he confesses having had to abandon a conjecture which intrigued him, for "the evidence of Puritan influence on common law and vice versa did not materialize."1 He retreats to a relationship between Puritanism and common law which he is able amply to support, "one of ideological parallelism." His analysis concerns the substance of what men perseveringly wanted and manifestly expressed in the early seventeenth century, not with what the twentieth century might articulate for them. For his period of intensive study he takes the years 1603 to 1630, which were sketched in broader strokes by Notestein in his The English People on the Eve of Colonization.2 Although the first five chapters of the Eusden book deal with ideas and events familiar to students of the seventeenth century, the author engages in an organization of this material essential to his purpose. The Puritans of his study comprise three groups who worked together in their common predicament but were differentiated by their concepts of church organization-the Puritan Anglicans, the Presbyterians, and the Independents or pre-Civil-War "nonseparating Congregationalists," who favored an estab- lished but loosely federated church.
    [Show full text]
  • The Ramist Style of John Udall: Audience and Pictorial Logic in Puritan Sermon and Controversy
    Oral Tradition, 2/1 (1987): 188-213 The Ramist Style of John Udall: Audience and Pictorial Logic in Puritan Sermon and Controversy John G. Rechtien With Wilbur Samuel Howell’s Logic and Rhetoric in England, 1500-1700 (1956), Walter J. Ong’s Ramus, Method, and the Decay of Dialogue (1958) helped establish the common contemporary view that Ramism impoverished logic and rhetoric as arts of communication.1 For example, scholars agree that Ramism neglected audience accomodation; denied truth as an object of rhetoric by reserving it to logic; rejected persuasion about probabilities; and relegated rhetoric to ornamentation.2 Like Richard Hooker in Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (I.vi.4), these scholars criticize Ramist logic as simplistic. Their objections identify the consequences of Ramus’ visual analogy of logic and rhetoric to “surfaces,” which are “apprehended by sight” and divorced from “voice and hearing” (Ong 1958:280). As a result of his analogy of knowledge and communication to vision rather than to sound, Ramus left rhetoric only two of its fi ve parts, ornamentation (fi gures of speech and tropes) and delivery (voice and gesture). He stripped three parts (inventio, dispositio, and memory) from rhetoric. Traditionally shared by logic and rhetoric, the recovery and derivation of ideas (inventio) and their organization (dispositio) were now reserved to logic. Finally, Ramus’ method of organizing according to dichotomies substituted “mental space” for memory (Ong 1958:280). In the context of this new logic and the rhetoric dependent on it, a statement was not recognized as a part of a conversation, but appeared to stand alone as a speech event fi xed in space.
    [Show full text]
  • View 2019 Edition Online
    Emmanuel Emmanuel College College MAGAZINE 2018–2019 Front Court, engraved by R B Harraden, 1824 VOL CI MAGAZINE 2018–2019 VOLUME CI Emmanuel College St Andrew’s Street Cambridge CB2 3AP Telephone +44 (0)1223 334200 The Master, Dame Fiona Reynolds, in the new portrait by Alastair Adams May Ball poster 1980 THE YEAR IN REVIEW I Emmanuel College MAGAZINE 2018–2019 VOLUME CI II EMMANUEL COLLEGE MAGAZINE 2018–2019 The Magazine is published annually, each issue recording college activities during the preceding academical year. It is circulated to all members of the college, past and present. Copy for the next issue should be sent to the Editors before 30 June 2020. News about members of Emmanuel or changes of address should be emailed to [email protected], or via the ‘Keeping in Touch’ form: https://www.emma.cam.ac.uk/members/keepintouch. College enquiries should be sent to [email protected] or addressed to the Development Office, Emmanuel College, Cambridge CB2 3AP. General correspondence concerning the Magazine should be addressed to the General Editor, College Magazine, Dr Lawrence Klein, Emmanuel College, Cambridge CB2 3AP. Correspondence relating to obituaries should be addressed to the Obituaries Editor (The Dean, The Revd Jeremy Caddick), Emmanuel College, Cambridge CB2 3AP. The college telephone number is 01223 334200, and the email address is [email protected]. If possible, photographs to accompany obituaries and other contributions should be high-resolution scans or original photos in jpeg format. The Editors would like to express their thanks to the many people who have contributed to this issue, with a special nod to the unstinting assistance of the College Archivist.
    [Show full text]
  • Darwin and Doubt and the Response of the Victorian Churches Churchman 100/4 1986
    Darwin and Doubt and the Response of the Victorian Churches Churchman 100/4 1986 Nigel Scotland The Bible and Nineteenth Century Christians Although the Victorian Era was seen as one of the high points in the practice of English Christianity, and although outwardly speaking Church attendance remained at a relatively high level, below the surface many people were beginning to express a variety of doubts about the inspiration of the Bible and about points of Christian doctrine which had been cherished for centuries. These doubts stemmed in the main from two sources: discoveries in Science and the development of Biblical Criticism. The former caused men to question the traditional explanation of world origins and the latter brought doubts regarding the traditional doctrine of the inspiration of scripture. The main root of the problem lay in the Churches’ view of the scriptures. The Church in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century held a view of the scriptures which had been taken over from Greek thought in the early Christian centuries and been further reinforced by the Reformation. They thought of God literally breathing the Scripture into the writers of the Biblical documents. The result of this was that the Bible was held to speak authoritatively on all matters whether they related to man’s relationship to God or to the scientific origins of the Universe. The ordinary Christian man and woman in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries regarded the Judaeo-Christian religion as an Historical religion. It concerned the story of God’s historical acts in relation to his people.
    [Show full text]
  • John Durie (1596–1680): Defragmenter of the Reformation
    7. Jahrgang MBS TEXTE 148 2010 George M. Ella John Durie (1596–1680): Defragmenter of the Reformation BUCER IN S T E M R A I N M A R 2 1 : E P 4 H ReformedReformiertes Forum Forum TableInhaltsverzeichnis of Contents Part One: Europe and Britain Working Together ..................... 3 Part Two: Ideas of Union Grow ................................................ 8 Part Three: Working for Cromwell ......................................... 14 Annotation ............................................................................. 20 The Author ............................................................................. 21 Impressum ............................................................................. 22 1. Aufl. 2010 John Durie (1596–1680): Defragmenter of the Reformation John Durie (1596–1680): Defragmenter of the Reformation George M. Ella Part One: Europe and is the modern man of God today who Britain Working Together is world-renowned as a great preacher, pastor, diplomat, educator, scientist, lin- Who on earth is John Durie? guist, translator, man of letters, ambas- Most computer users have experi- sador, library reformer, mediator and enced hard disks full of jumbled, frag- politician? Who today produces best- mented files which block spaces causing sellers on a monthly basis, writing in memory and retrieval problems. What half a dozen different languages? In all a relief it is to switch on a defragmenter these fields John Durie has been called and have everything made ship-shape ‘great’ or ‘the greatest’, yet he is forgot- again. The Reformation in mid-seven- ten by his mother country whom he teenth century Britain had reached such served so long and well. This is perhaps a fragmentation and a defragmenter was because it is beyond human imagination called for. The man for the job was cer- that such a man could have existed and tainly John Durie who was possibly the his ‘type’ today is not called for.
    [Show full text]
  • Eagle 1909 Michaelmas
    IV CONTENTS. PAGE From a Latin Hymn on St John the Evangelist Voluntaries 224 The Hymn Book 226 Halley's Comet 229 "Cornish Breakers" 236 Obituary 237 Our Chronicle 239 The Library 247 Notes tram 277 the College Records (con/iuued) In 28'i\ Memoriam : Edward VII. THE EAGLE. "By your Worship 317 and a Dymchurch Jury" St 318 Venus' Eve October Term 1909. The Rose by Other Names 328 The Book Invisible 332 Hallucinations 345 The Upper River 347 THE QUATER CENTENARY OF The New Hymn Book and 353 Certain of Our Own Poets LADY MARGARET. Epigram 354 The Hand 358 of Plato in Modern Legislation Catullus 359 [llN St Peter's day, 29 June 1909, the four­ hundredth anniversary of Lady Margaret's The New Window in Chapel 363 death, the Dean of Westminster preached in Commemoration Sermon 364 the Abbey at the afternoon service on our Unveiling of the New Window 377 Memorial Service 387 saintly Foundress, whose tomb, by Torrigiano, is one Reviews 389 of the jewels of the church. Obituary: 390 Near midnight a party viewed the tomb and other Rev Herbert Edward Trotter M.A. monuments by lamp-light, and the Dean distributed Rev Edwarcl Kerslake Kerslake M.A .. 396 photographs of Torrigiano's masterpiece. Richard Burton 398 Worthington M. A. At eight o'clock there met in the Jerusalem Chamber Our Chronicle 399 guests representing all the foundations of Lady Margaret, The Library 400 and all the places where she has left a name. The hosts List of Subscribers, 421 1909-10. were the Dean and Chapter of Westminster.
    [Show full text]
  • Bibliotheca Sacra
    Tlte American Republic. 135 ART I C LEV Ill. THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC AND THE DEBS INSURRECTION. BY MR. Z. SWIFT HOLBROOK. THE American Republic is the fruitage of a religious inspiration. Our democratic institutions, ollr notions of lib­ erty and equality, had their origin with men who practised every form of self-denial, that they might be free from hie­ rarchical authority and worship God according to the dic­ tates of conscience. They were not men, like the colony that landed at Jamestown in 1607, moved by the spirit of adventure or by the desire to acquire,-both worthy and useful passions when subordinated to higher ends,-but they came to an unknown land, braving the perils of the sea and enduring the privations incident to such a perilous journey, that they might have freedom to worship God. To what extent these men had caught the inspiration of Luther and had given it a new interpretation, need not here be traced; but the age was one of discovery, of hero­ ism, of adventure, of awakened intellect,-giving the world the revival of faith, hope, and learning. It was the Eliza­ bethan Age in literature. It was the period of the centuries when, freed from the bonds of ecclesiastical authority, indi­ vidualism burst the barriers which had restrained it, and men took on new conceptions of liberty and of individual worth. Man as an individual, a unit, free and independent in his re­ lations to the unseen, and bound by social compacts only because thus his individualism found higher freedom and fuller .development,-this was the conception that inspired [Jan.
    [Show full text]
  • Cromwelliana 2012
    CROMWELLIANA 2012 Series III No 1 Editor: Dr Maxine Forshaw CONTENTS Editor’s Note 2 Cromwell Day 2011: Oliver Cromwell – A Scottish Perspective 3 By Dr Laura A M Stewart Farmer Oliver? The Cultivation of Cromwell’s Image During 18 the Protectorate By Dr Patrick Little Oliver Cromwell and the Underground Opposition to Bishop 32 Wren of Ely By Dr Andrew Barclay From Civilian to Soldier: Recalling Cromwell in Cambridge, 44 1642 By Dr Sue L Sadler ‘Dear Robin’: The Correspondence of Oliver Cromwell and 61 Robert Hammond By Dr Miranda Malins Mrs S C Lomas: Cromwellian Editor 79 By Dr David L Smith Cromwellian Britain XXIV : Frome, Somerset 95 By Jane A Mills Book Reviews 104 By Dr Patrick Little and Prof Ivan Roots Bibliography of Books 110 By Dr Patrick Little Bibliography of Journals 111 By Prof Peter Gaunt ISBN 0-905729-24-2 EDITOR’S NOTE 2011 was the 360th anniversary of the Battle of Worcester and was marked by Laura Stewart’s address to the Association on Cromwell Day with her paper on ‘Oliver Cromwell: a Scottish Perspective’. ‘Risen from Obscurity – Cromwell’s Early Life’ was the subject of the study day in Huntingdon in October 2011 and three papers connected with the day are included here. Reflecting this subject, the cover illustration is the picture ‘Cromwell on his Farm’ by Ford Madox Brown (1821–1893), painted in 1874, and reproduced here courtesy of National Museums Liverpool. The painting can be found in the Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight Village, Wirral, Cheshire. In this edition of Cromwelliana, it should be noted that the bibliography of journal articles covers the period spring 2009 to spring 2012, addressing gaps in the past couple of years.
    [Show full text]
  • Luke Challoner, D
    Irish Church Quarterly Luke Challoner, D. D. Author(s): N. J. D. White Reviewed work(s): Source: The Irish Church Quarterly, Vol. 2, No. 7 (Jul., 1909), pp. 207-223 Published by: Irish Church Quarterly Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30066936 . Accessed: 07/03/2012 20:23 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Irish Church Quarterly is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Irish Church Quarterly. http://www.jstor.org LUKE CHALLONER. 207 LUKE CHALLONER, D.D.1 IN the noble panegyric by the son of Sirach which begins, " Let us now praise famous men, and our fathers that begat us," the name of Zerubbabel has an honourable place. All that we know about him is that he was a prince of David's line who, in response to the decree of Cyrus, " went up " as leader of those who returned from captivity in Babylon; and, in spite of many discouragements, carried through the rebuilding of God's temple in Jerusalem; an ordinary man, pro- bably, who succeeded where a genius might have failed; who rose to the demand made upon his patriotism by the circumstances of his time; who was great only because he did not shirk an unattractive duty; one who did not make history, but brought an epoch to the birth; felix opportunitate nativitatis ejus.
    [Show full text]
  • Sederi VIII (1997) NEW ENGLAND PURITANS: ‘THE LORD’S Free PEOPLE’ 77 the Puritan Need of Liberty
    New England Puritans: “the Lord’s FREE People” Susana M. Jiménez Placer UNIVERSIDAD DE SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA The relationship between Puritanism and the concept of liberty has been controversial since the very origin of this religious sect in the XVIth. century. The Puritan defence of the dignity of the individual contributed to the dissolution of the feudal system in Great Britain and constituted one of the basic pillars in the development of capitalistic and parliamentary systems: during the 17th. century the growing middle-class saw the basis for a new social and political order in this doctrine that proposed the “integral sanctification of ordinary life” (Taylor 221) and labour as the only means to serve God and obey his calling. But the Puritan sect was not homogeneous: the main branch within this religious group was constituted by Presbyterian Puritans, who defended the model of a “comprehensive, national but Calvinistic church tightly disciplined from the centre” (Brogan 44), with membership enforced by the state and ruled by “a hierarchy of governing bodies, from the national assembly down through the regional classis to the presbytery of the parish church, consisting of the minister and elders” (Miller 2). The existence of clear disagreements concerning church organization among Puritans became evident in the 17th. century: some followers of the Puritan ideal proposed a congregational1 model based on a free covenant with God. According to their model each church was particular and each congregation had the power to choose -more or less democratically- their ministers and elders. Membership was voluntary: only those willing to enter into the covenant with God could become members of the congregation.
    [Show full text]
  • Great Cloud of Witnesses.Indd
    A Great Cloud of Witnesses i ii A Great Cloud of Witnesses A Calendar of Commemorations iii Copyright © 2016 by The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of The Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America Portions of this book may be reproduced by a congregation for its own use. Commercial or large-scale reproduction for sale of any portion of this book or of the book as a whole, without the written permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, is prohibited. Cover design and typesetting by Linda Brooks ISBN-13: 978-0-89869-962-3 (binder) ISBN-13: 978-0-89869-966-1 (pbk.) ISBN-13: 978-0-89869-963-0 (ebook) Church Publishing, Incorporated. 19 East 34th Street New York, New York 10016 www.churchpublishing.org iv Contents Introduction vii On Commemorations and the Book of Common Prayer viii On the Making of Saints x How to Use These Materials xiii Commemorations Calendar of Commemorations Commemorations Appendix a1 Commons of Saints and Propers for Various Occasions a5 Commons of Saints a7 Various Occasions from the Book of Common Prayer a37 New Propers for Various Occasions a63 Guidelines for Continuing Alteration of the Calendar a71 Criteria for Additions to A Great Cloud of Witnesses a73 Procedures for Local Calendars and Memorials a75 Procedures for Churchwide Recognition a76 Procedures to Remove Commemorations a77 v vi Introduction This volume, A Great Cloud of Witnesses, is a further step in the development of liturgical commemorations within the life of The Episcopal Church. These developments fall under three categories. First, this volume presents a wide array of possible commemorations for individuals and congregations to observe.
    [Show full text]