The Hypothetical Universalists (Davenant-Calamy Line)

The bloc — led by Edmund Calamy the Elder and including Richard Vines, Lazarus Seaman, John Arrowsmith, Stephen Marshall, William Spurstowe, Thomas Young, and Matthew Newcomen — that defended hypothetical universalism in the atonement: Christ's death is sufficient for all and intended conditionally for all who believe, while efficacious only for the elect. The position descended from John Davenant (the British delegate at the Synod of Dort who had taught Calamy at Pembroke Cambridge). The Confession's language (WCF III.6, VIII.5, VIII.8) was drafted broadly enough to accommodate both the strict-particularist majority and the hypothetical-universalist minority. This is perhaps the Standards' most significant deliberate latitude.