laudable Practice

As we continue to explore the Aberdeen Doctors, the group of eirenic thinkers centred around Patrick Forbes, Bishop of Aberdeen 1618-35, we turn to another aspect of the sermon preached at Forbes' funeral by one of their number, Robert Baron. Last week , in the introduction to this series, we saw how Baron's sermon praised Forbes as the Athanasius of the North. This week's post considers something somewhat more subtle but no less significant in what it says about the Aberdeen Doctors.  The text for Baron's sermon was Revelation 14.13, "Blessed are the dead, which die in the Lord". As he considers the text, Baron first outlines how it was interpreted by Roman Catholic divines: But two thinges doe heere occur, which do need explicatio: One is, whether or not this particular part bee so ample, as that it comprehendeth all the godlie, or elect? The other is, how, and in what sense, these whom it comprehendeth, are sayd to die in the Lord?  As for the first; some ...

Today is the final post - of a series which commenced in late August last year - on the 1621 account of the 1618 General Assembly of the Church of Scotland held at Perth , by David Lindsay, Bishop of Brechin (1619-34 and Bishop of Edinburgh 1634-38). I return to the preface of the work, in which Lindsay sets out the very basis for the moderation and eirenicism which accepts the Articles of Perth . Holy Scripture, he stated in Hookerian fashion, provided latitude to the Church in ordering its life and worship: Finally, to end this point of the power of the Church, when the people are conuened in the ordinarie place, and at the times appointed, the Scripture hath not set downe, whereat the Pastour should beginne, how hee should proceed, and wherewith hee should close vp this Seruice: as whether hee should beginne with singing of Psalmes, or praying, or reading, or preaching; and when hee prayes, with what petition he shall beginne, what he shall subioyne next, and so forth: what order ...