The Limits of Scrupling and the Adoption Act of 1729:
A Brief Analysis of the PUP Task Force's Historical
Problem
By Toby Brown, Pastor, First Presbyterian Church, Cuero, Texas
We Presbyterians suffer today from a terrible case of historical amnesia. Perhaps we
caught this from our surrounding culture’s disdain of history and its preference
instead for theatrics. We live in a sound-bite driven media culture that leaves little
time for patient scholarship and rational discourse. Unfortunately, for such a historic
faith, we Presbyterians are showing more and more the symptoms of this historical
amnesia from which our nation suffers. We show these symptoms all too often: We
quote selectively from our own historical documents and even our own confessions to
prove a point. We don’t listen enough to all sides of an argument and we don’t take
the time and effort to read the documents in question for ourselves.
Instead, we turn to voices who offer quick and superficial readings of our history.
Frequently these persons offer emotional appeals that ask us to “feel” at the expense
of thinking through the consequences of the very ideas that we are being asked to
adopt. Historical documents are often at least quoted as evidence, but too often, all
that is really offered are proof-texts lifted up as summarizing entire arguments, while
assertions in these same documents that would contradict the proffered analysis are
ignored. Only in a historically challenged society, such as ours today, could this be
done as frequently and brazenly as it is done these days.
In these contentious times, with church unity fractured and our future together in
question, we need to ask more of the Task Force than their present offering of a
misleading reading of the Adopting Act of 1729. Standing in the historic stream of
Presbyterianism in North America, we have the stated standards of Presbyterian
polity and essentials that come from this document as an essential guide to our
founding principles. Don’t we owe the church a better explanation of why we believe
rather than misreading our history? If so, then at the very least, this explanation of
our history should flow directly from our historical self-understanding and founding
documents. The church deserves an accurate account of our history and our
historical documents from our leaders, whether they agree with it or not.
I read with disappointment the portion of the recent report of the Task Force on
Peace Unity and Purity of the Church that offered a misleading summary of the intent
and substance of the Adopting Act of 1729. To address this, I intend here to briefly
analyze portions of the Task Force Report that bring up the historical reference to
“scrupling” and its limits, as taken from the Adopting Act itself. The Task Force
Report argues in a number of places that it is a historic principle of Presbyterianism
to allow differences on “nonessential” points in our theology. They also assert that
the Adopting Act can be cited to affirm the principle that each presbytery can be left
free to determine what these points are. Here is one portion of the Task Force Report
that makes this case (Line 716-736, italics mine):
The tension between conscience and forbearance, on the one hand, and respect for
the will of the whole body, on the other, has naturally occasioned the questions:
What matters of belief and discipline are “essential and necessary” and, thus, require
strict conformity, and where in such matters can latitude be permitted? As early as
1729, American Presbyterians faced these questions in relation to ministerial
ordination. The then highest judicatory of the church, the synod, adopted the
Westminster standards as its basis of faith and required all ministers to subscribe to
them. This firmly established the American Presbyterian church as a confessional
body with a single set of standards for faith and practice. The question of freedom of
conscience under Scripture emerged immediately, however, because some ministers
of the synod considered certain articles in the standards to be at variance with, or at
least not explicitly enjoined by, Scripture. The synod resolved this conflict of
conscience by permitting these ministers and, later, candidates for the ministry to
declare their disagreements (“scruples”) with particular articles of the Westminster
standards. It then delegated to the examining body the responsibility for determining
whether the candidate’s disagreement concerned an essential article of the church’s
“doctrine, worship or government.” Although the Adopting Act was later modified, it
established a precedent that has heavily influenced American Presbyterians’
understanding of their confessional commitments to this day. Therefore, the church
has consistently maintained that certain beliefs and practices are indispensable for
the church’s theological integrity. At the same time, “differences always have existed
and been allowed as to [the] modes of explaining and theorizing within the metes
and bounds of the one accepted system.”
So, we should ask, what were these “certain articles that were at variance with or at
least not explicitly enjoined by, Scripture”? What of these “scruples” on which
Presbyterians could differ from Westminster? Are there limits? Let’s go the cited
document itself. Here is the relevant portion of the preliminaries of the Adopting Act
itself (Italics mine):
§ 7. Act Preliminary to the Adopting Act.
“And in case any Minister of this Synod, or any candidate for the ministry, shall have
any scruple with respect to any article or articles of said Confession or Catechisms,
he shall at the time of his making said declaration declare his sentiments to the
Presbytery or Synod, who shall, notwithstanding, admit him to the exercise of the
ministry within our bounds and to ministerial communion if the Synod or Presbytery
shall judge his scruple or mistake to be only about articles not essential and
necessary in doctrine, worship or government.”
Scrupling then, was only allowed on articles that are deemed as “not essential”. The
Task Force agrees with this point and there is no argument that the Adopting Act did
hold all ministers to the essential articles of the Confession. But the point must then
be asked: What are these essential and nonessential points and who defines them?
What level of disagreement with Westminster was allowed? Were those essential and
nonessential articles defined? Yes, they were! The Presbyteries were not left without
guidance in these matters. The limits were set, upon how far we could agree to
disagree on essential matters, as the next selection shows.
Here is a portion of the actual Adopting Act of 1729: (italics and bold mine)
§ 8. The Adopting Act.
"All the Ministers of this Synod now present, except one,…after proposing all the
scruples that any of them had to make against any articles and expressions in the
Confession of Faith and Larger and Shorter Catechisms of the Assembly of Divines at
Westminster, have unanimously agreed in the solution of those scruples, and in
declaring the said Confession and Catechisms to be the confession of their faith,
excepting only some clauses in the twentieth and twenty-third chapters,
concerning which clauses the Synod do unanimously declare, that they do not
received those articles in any such sense as to suppose the civil magistrate hath a
controlling power over Synods with respect to the exercise of their ministerial
authority; or power to persecute any for their religion, or in any sense contrary to
the Protestant succession to the throne of Great Britain.”
The above quote shows clearly that the essential matters consisted of every part of
the confession, except the selected chapters 20 and 23. The unity of faith and
witness for these early American Presbyterians was agreed on every point, as
outlined in Westminster, except as regards the role of the civil magistrate and
church/state affairs. The limits of allowable differences were clearly defined in the
Adopting Act for the ordaining bodies, be they Synods or Presbyteries. This Adopting
Act can still be a clear model for the church, if we are willing to read it fairly and in
its entirety.
Clearly, in referencing the Adopting Act as justification for advocating Presbytery
allowance on determining essentials each for itself, as they do later (albeit obliquely)
argue in their Recommendation 5, the Task Force misrepresents the point of the Act
itself. Presbyteries and Synods could only allow “scruples” up to a certain and
designated point. This was seen as the basis for peace, unity and purity: a doctrine
that was held in common by all the ordained officers of the newly organized
Presbyterian Church.
There is no room for making the argument that the Adopting Act leaves room for
Presbyterians to define for themselves (individually or as Presbyteries) the essentials
of the faith from the nonessentials. According to the Adopting Act and the earliest
American Presbyterians, the church itself, as a corporate and unified body, decides
what is essential and the church then has the duty of defining these essentials.
If the Task Force wants to use our history or confessions to argue for a de facto Local
Option on essential matters of faith and practice for ordination, as they do in
Recommendation 5, then they should have looked elsewhere for support! The
Adopting Act speaks for itself, if only we will take the time to listen.