Jeremy Taylor Week: The Nicene Creed and the holy Scriptures

Yesterday's post considered Taylor's understanding of the Creed of Nicaea in The Liberty of Prophesying, published in 1646. Taylor was then a relatively young 33 years old, in holy orders for 13 years, and belonging to the defeated party in the first Civil War. If, as was suggested yesterday, The Liberty of Prophesying was intended to a theological justification for the royal policy of seeking an accommodation with the Independents amongst the Parliamentarians, we might have expected Taylor's thinking to have significantly changed when we reach the final years of his life, when he wrote the Dissuasive from Popery, published in 1664 and 1667, the year of his death. He was then a bishop in the restored established Church, with the monarch again upon his throne, and the bitter experiences of the 1640s and 50s in the past. 

It is significant, however, that Taylor's understanding of the Creed of Nicaea's relationship to Scripture is maintained across these decades. In the second part of the Dissuasive, he demonstrates how the authority of the Nicene Creed is dependent upon Scripture, not Tradition:

And therefore S. Athanasius speaking concerning the Nicene Council, made no scruple that the question was sufficiently determin'd concerning the proper Divinity of the Son of God, because it was determin'd, and the faith was expounded according to the Scriptures; and affirms that the faith so determin'd was sufficient for the reproof of all impiety (meaning in the Article of Christ's Divinity) and for the establishment of the Orthodox faith in Christ. Nay, he affirms that the Catholic Christians will neither speak, nor endure to hear any thing in religion that is a stranger to Scripture; it being an evil heart of immodesty to speak those things which are not written. Which words I the rather remark, because this Article of the Consubstantiality of Christ with the Father, is brought as an instance (by the Romanists) of the necessity of tradition, to make up the insufficiency of Scripture. But not in this only, but for the preaching of the truth indefinitely, that is, the whole truth of the Gospel, he affirms the Scriptures to be sufficient. For writing to Macarius a Priest of Alexandria, he tells him that the knowledge of true and divine religion and piety, does not much need the ministry of man; and that he might abundantly draw this forth from the divine books and letters: for truly the holy and divinely-inspir'd Scriptures are sufficient for the preaching of the truth; ad omnem instructionem veritatis; so the Latine Translation; for the whole instruction of truth; or the instruction of all truth. 

The "Consubstantiality of Christ with the Father" is "the faith ... expounded according to the Scriptures". This, indeed, as Taylor shows, was the insistence of the great champion of Nicaea, Athanasius. Here we see not the need for Tradition, but the sufficiency of holy Scripture, as stated in Article VI of the Thirty-nine. It is also the confession of Article VIII, that the Nicene Creed "may be proved by most certain warrants of holy Scripture". 

That this affirmation of the sufficiency of holy Scripture was thoroughly patristic is seen in Athanasius' letter to the presbyter Macarius. What, however, of Macarius' desire for sources from the Fathers to guide and instruct him?

But because Macarius desir'd rather to hear others teach him this doctrine and true religion, than himself to draw it from Scripture, S. Athanasius tells him, that there are many written monuments of the Holy Fathers, and our masters, which if men will diligently read over, he shall learn the interpretation of Scriptures, and obtain that notion of truth which he desires. Which is perfectly the same advice which the Church of England commands her Sons; that they shall teach nothing but what the Fathers and Doctors of the Church draw forth from Scriptures.

This, declares Taylor, is simply the view of the Church of England, as expressed in Canon 6 of the Canons of 1571, 'Concerning Preachers':

especially shall they see to it that they teach nothing in the way of a sermon, which they would have religiously held and believed by the people, save what is agreeable to the teaching of the Old or New Testament, and what the Catholic fathers and ancient bishops have collected from this selfsame doctrine. 

To read the Fathers is not to follow another source of revelation alongside the Scriptures; it is, rather, to be pointed to the Scriptures as saving truth. And it was on this basis that the council fathers at Nicaea confessed the consubstantiality of the Son.

Against his Tridentine theological opponents, Taylor also cautions against exaggerated claims for Nicaea:

But because other things also are pretended to be, or are necessary, and yet are said not to be in Scripture, it is necessary that this should be examin'd, 1. First, all the Nicene definitions, Trinity of persons in one Divine essence. This I should not have thought worthy of considering in the words here expressed ... but yet an adversary ... is pleas'd to use these words in the objection. To this I answer first, that this Gentleman would be much to seek if he were put to it, to prove the Trinity of persons in one Divine essence to be an express Nicene definition; and therefore, if he means that as an instance of the Nicene definitions, he will find himself mistaken. Indeed at Nice, the Consubstantiality of the Father and the Son was determin'd; but nothing of the Divinity of the holy Ghost, That was the result of after-Councils. But whatever it was which was there determin'd, I am sure it was not determin'd by tradition, but by Scripture. 

Even if one were to hold to inflated claims for Tradition and Councils, Trinitarian faith could not be dependent upon Nicaea, which did not address the divinity of the Holy Spirit. This, however, Taylor asserts, is a distraction. Whether the consubstantiality of the Son, or the divine nature of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, both are determined, not by Tradition or Council, but by holy Scripture.

So S. Athanasius tells us of the faith which was confess'd by the Nicene Fathers; it was the faith confess'd according to the holy Scriptures: and speaking to Serapion of the holy Trinity, he says, Learn this out of the holy Scriptures. For the documents you find in them, are sufficient. And, writing against Samosatenus, he proves the Incarnation of the Son of God out of the Gospel of S. John, saying, It becomes us to stick close to the word of God. And therefore when Constantine the Emperor exhorted the Nicene Fathers to concord in the question then to be disputed; they being Divine matters, he would they should be ended by the authority of the Divine Scriptures. For, saith he, the books of the Evangelists and Apostles, as also the Oracles of the old Prophets, do evidently teach us what we are to think of the Deity. Therefore all seditious contention being laid aside, let us determine the things brought into question by the testimonies of the divinely inspired Scriptures. And they did so. And by relying on Scriptures only, we shall never be constrain'd to quit these glorious portions of Evangelical truth, the Incarnation of the eternal Word, and the Consubstantiality of the Father and the Son. 

The faith confessed by Nicaea - that the Eternal Word became flesh, and that the Word is consubstantial with the Father - is the "Evangelical truth" of the "divinely inspired Scriptures". To suggest otherwise, to contend that the faith confessed by Nicaea requires another source or authority, is to fundamentally undermine Christological and creedal orthodoxy:

Whatsoever ought to be known of these mysteries is contain'd in both Testaments; saith Rupertus Tuitiensis [the 11th century Benedictine theologian Rupert of Deutz], before quoted. And if the holy Scriptures did not teach us in these mysteries, we should find Tradition to be but a lame leg, or rather a reed of Egypt.

Taylor's metaphor is taken from Isaiah 36.6:

Lo, thou trustest in the staff of this broken reed, on Egypt; whereon if a man lean, it will go into his hand, and pierce it.

Such is the outcome when the faith of Nicaea - the confession of the consubstantiality of the Son - is not acknowledged as the teaching of holy Scripture but is presented as reliant upon the authority of Tradition and Council; such a claim wounds us, undermining the faith of Nicaea, presenting us with an uncertain and unreliable support. With Taylor, we gratefully acknowledge otherwise, that Nicene faith in the Son as consubstantial with the Father is the evangelical truth of holy Scripture.