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English Presbyterian Majority

Westminster Assembly, 1643–1649

The drafting core of the Assembly: the English ministers who held the majority on every contested polity vote and who produced the bulk of the Confession's text. They were presbyterian on polity (though many were jure-ecclesiastico rather than jure-divino), infralapsarian on the decree, particular on the atonement (with a significant hypothetical-universalist minority within their own ranks), strict-Sabbatarian, three-uses-of-the-law, and signs-and-seals on the sacraments. The Smectymnuans (Calamy, Marshall, Young, Newcomen, Spurstowe) were the most publicly visible subgroup. Most were ejected in 1662.

Anchor personas

Edmund Calamy the Elder 1600–1666 English Presbyterian minister Stephen Marshall c. 1594–1655 English Presbyterian minister Edward Reynolds 1599–1676 English Presbyterian minister Anthony Tuckney 1599–1670 English Presbyterian minister Cornelius Burgess 1589–1665 First Assessor William Gouge 1575–1653 English Presbyterian minister Herbert Palmer 1601–1647 English Presbyterian minister Obadiah Sedgwick c. 1600–1658 English Presbyterian minister Jeremiah Whitaker 1599–1654 English Presbyterian minister Anthony Burgess d. 1664 English Presbyterian minister Daniel Cawdrey 1588–1664 English Presbyterian minister

Departures from the Westminster baseline

English Presbyterian Majority departs from the Westminster baseline on 1 of the 35 attributes.

II · God & Decree · Order of Decrees

Infralapsarian override vs WCF: Deliberately-Permits-Both

Connected cruxes 28

Cruxes where this school's anchor personas were active parties, or where this tradition is mentioned in the legacy narrative.

The Canon and the Apocrypha August 1645 Good and Necessary Consequence 1644–1645 The Order of the Decrees 1644–1645 The Extent of the Atonement January 1646 The Decree of Reprobation 1645 The Covenant of Redemption 1645–1647 The Mosaic Covenant 1645–1646 The Children of Believers and the Sign of the Covenant 1645 The Imputation of Christ's Active Obedience August–October 1645 The Descent into Hell 1647 Justification and the Antinomian Crisis 1643–1647 Assurance: Of the Essence of Saving Faith? 1646–1647 The Perseverance of the Saints 1646 The Third Use of the Moral Law 1645–1646 The Strict Sabbath 1645 The Tripartite Division of the Law 1645 The Grand Debate over Polity October 1644 – January 1646 The Erastian Question July 1645 – November 1645 The Regulative Principle of Worship 1644–1645 Sacramental Efficacy: Signs and Seals 1646 The Rouse Psalter and Metrical Psalmody 1643–1648 The Magistrate and the Two Tables 1646; revised 1788 The Pope as Antichrist 1646 Lawful Oaths 1646 Grounds of Divorce: Adultery and Wilful Desertion 1646 The Conscious Intermediate State 1647 The Final Judgment and the Last Things 1647 The Solemn League and Covenant August–September 1643

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